Gray Skies
by Author Roy
Summary: Ranma, Nabiki, and Ryouga are all haphazardly dropped into a vortex in the middle of a fight and wake up in the middle of nowhere. Where are they, and how can they get back to Nerima? Thus begins their journey to return to a simpler time and place...
1. Lost

_-Nerima, Tokyo. Thursday, November 2nd, 1989-_

"You've gotten in my way for the last time, Saotome!" Gosunkugi bellowed from his place in the air.

Two horns protruded from the teen's head, and his eyes had a crimson, ethereal glow to them. The boy's skin had turned an indigo color, and his odd cloak billowed in fierce winds as the teen hovered at least ten meters above Ranma and most of his cohorts. Ryouga, Mousse, Akane, Cologne, and oddly enough, even Nabiki and Kuno were all present. Just moments ago they'd all been caught up in a brawl for the _Panties from Hell, _but this new interloper had their focus. They were gathered before the Tendou property on the street, and the normally blue sky was darkened with gray clouds, lightning flashing in the distance accompanied by ominous thunderclaps.

Oddly enough, although Ranma wasn't going to complain, it had not yet begun to rain.

In the air beside Gosunkugi floated a positively ancient looking tome. The ragged, brown pages were completely unaffected by the wind, and the boy and book were connected by an unearthly red tendril.

"For the suffering I've endured at your hands, _you will __**perish!**_" The teen pointed a clawed finger at the pig-tailed teen.

"Oh come on, I hardly even know you!" Ranma griped as he dodged a lightning bolt. And it was true; Ranma hadn't seen or heard of Gosunkugi for an incredibly long time. It had been months, at the very least. "What the hell could I have done to _you_, idiot?"

"Heh," Gosunkugi shook his head. "You wouldn't know. No one notices me." He narrowed his eyes to slits at the world-class martial artist. "And it's because jocks like you _exist _that guys like me are treated like dirt, Saotome! You and all of your stupid little friends! I'll see you _destroyed!_" The boy waved his hand and both Ranma and Ryouga jumped to avoid the next bolt of lightning.

"Why the hell bring _us_ into this?" complained Ryouga. "We're not Ranma's friends!"

"That's right, Saotome has slighted us as well!" Mousse agreed. "I refuse to be attacked because of someone like him!"

"_Silence!_" Gosunkugi sneered.

Mousse narrowed his eyes and moved to avoid the next bolt, but it hit him anyway. The boy fell to the ground as steam rose off his unmoving body.

"Mousse! You _idiot_…" Ranma shook his head. '_Getting that guy to look your way with all that metal on you… nice going, moron.'_

"That boy is possessed by a demon, Son-in-law," Cologne called out to the pig-tailed teen from the sidelines.

"I can _see_ _**that**_, you old _bag!_" The boy yelled as he leapt aside to dodge another lightning bolt. "He sure _looks_ possessed to _me!_"

"You fool!" Cologne shouted as she threw her cane at him. It impacted his skull and knocked him onto the ground. "Listen. All you need to do is target the book! That is what appears to be the demon's medium!"

"…Oh. The book, huh?" Ranma looked up at the impressive tome. '_Now that I think about it_, _it does look pretty evil. Got that nasty red glow and all.' _He grinned and cracked his knuckles. "All right then. If I can beat the crap out of flaming chickens, I can beat the crap out of flying books," Ranma snorted. '_Let's see… a ki blast should do the trick, easy enough.' _He started running towards Gosunkugi, dodging several errant lightning bolts on the way, then leapt up high into the air. A glowing, blue aura appeared around his body and he threw both fists forward. "_Mouko Takabisha!_"

The energy projected away from him in the form of a sphere, but a black wall appeared between him and his target, and swallowed up the projectile. The portal also disappeared soon afterwards and Gosunkugi smirked. Ranma hid his confusion with a confident grin as he fell back to the ground.

"So you can do more than throw around those little lightning bolts, eh? At least I'm not going to be beating on a one trick pony again." Ranma took up a stance and watched his opponent carefully. '_If he can do something like that, getting close is probably not a good idea… maybe I can rile him up, get a little tornado action going…'_

"You'll regret taking me lightly Saotome," The boy growled. He waved one of his hands in a complicated motion and another black portal opened up directly above Ranma, many times larger than the first.

Ranma hid his surprise at the initial appearance of the black wall, but before he could react, a gigantic, blue sphere of energy shot from the wall at him. It slammed into him at once, and drove him into the concrete with the force of a meteor before detonating after several seconds, sending a powerful shockwave throughout the entire district and leaving a crater that stretched across the street, at the bottom of which Ranma lay, unmoving.

The teenagers gathered there all recovered from the shockwave with a degree of awe on their faces as they stared at the raw destruction.

"Did he just suck… up one of Saotome's attacks… make it a _hell_ of a lot stronger, then throw it back at him?" Nabiki asked from her place on the sidelines with Akane and Cologne.

"Evidently," Cologne muttered. "It would seem this is more serious a situation than any of us had considered…"

"Yeah, you got that right," Nabiki said, shocked. "Gosunkugi is a complete nobody. He's weaker than weak, nerdier than nerdy, and a stalker. For him to come out of nowhere and _beat_ Ranma… that's one hell of a power up!" She narrowed her eyes. "I'm sure someone would be willing to pay a _lot_ of money for something like that…"

"Son-in-law is not yet defeated," the elder spat out. "And the one fighting Ranma is the _Demon_, spurred on by that boy's hatred for him."

Ryouga grunted.

"I may not want to, but it looks like Saotome won't win this one without some help." Ryouga snorted as he uncrossed his arms and started to walk toward crater just as Ranma began to sit up.

"Kuno! Why don't you do something?" Akane asked as she noticed the wannabe swordsman standing beside them.

"It is as Hibiki said before, I do not wish to become involved with this," the boy snorted. "That demon's qualm is with the pig-tailed charlatan, not me."

"This is too serious to be fooling around, you buffoon," Cologne growled. "This is a powerful demon indeed. We may not be able to destroy it outright, but I can seal it. I must return to the _Cat Café _to gather the appropriate wards." She pogoed over to Mousse and surveyed his body for an instant. "Hmph, still alive, eh?" She hefted the boy over a shoulder and leapt up and away. "You all try to keep that monster busy! I will return as soon as possible!"

"Okay!" Akane nodded as she ran out to join the fight. Nabiki reached out and grabbed her sister, holding her back. "What? Nabiki! What are you doing?"

"Hold on, sis," Nabiki said with a frown. "I know you pride yourself on being a martial artist, but this guy is on a whole different level! He's a literal _monster!_"

"So? I can't stand back and watch as Ranma and Ryouga-kun fight that _thing_ alone!" She said as she pointed at the combatants. Ranma and Ryouga were again dodging lightning bolts as they leapt through the air trying to tag their foe but he was too high and neither one was willing to see how many balls of Ki he could repeat that trick with.

"Hold, fair Akane," Kuno started. Both girls looked at him, though Akane did so with a glare. "Does the foul sorcerer truly mean so much to you that you would risk your life against the forces of hell itself to save him?"

"I don't know anything about any foul sorcerers…" Akane growled out. "But…_Ranma_… He's saved my life so many times. I want… I want to return the favor! Just sitting on the side all the time, as his damsel in distress- it's _disgusting!_" She forcefully pulled away from her older sister and started towards the battlefield once again.

Kuno closed his eyes for a long moment, the suddenly shot away at top speed. The girl blinked in surprise when the other teen overtook her easily, then, with bokken in hand, leapt up in front of both Ranma and Ryouga, who were both on the ground and struggling to stand. He sliced upwards, at a lightning bolt, splitting it in two, each just shy of the fighters on the ground..

Everyone stared slack-jawed at what the boy had just done as he landed just in front of the other two.

"Glad you decided to help," Ranma muttered as he and Ryouga both stood up. "We've got a plan, but it'll be easier to pull off with you running interference."

Kuno nodded, and Gosunkugi scowled at the three boys on the ground before him.

"You fools cannot hope to stand against me!" Gosunkugi snarled out as his left fist glowed red. He threw a punch at them, and they scattered as an orb of flames hit the ground where they'd been standing.

The force from the ensuing explosion sent them flying, and as Kuno recovered in midair, he noticed Ranma and Ryouga do the same before landing beside Nabiki. Both Tendou sisters had been knocked to their feet by the explosion, and as Kuno surveyed the destruction, he could see that many of the homes in the immediate vicinity had been damaged from the repeated shockwaves and lightning bolts.

"It's time to end this. I won't give you the chance to pull anything sneaky," Gosunkugi growled as he lifted a hand.

Ranma was only mildly aware of a sudden falling sensation as a blue portal opened beneath him, Ryouga, and Nabiki. Akane turned and screamed in horror as she stood up and ran towards them, reaching the portal in time to see it close. The last thing she'd seen was a pained expression on Ranma's face as he fell further and further away from her.

**-****スクライド****-**

Disclaimer: None of the series, characters, or locations mentioned in this story are owned by the author of this story unless stated otherwise.

**GRAY SKIES**

**-**Chapter 1: Lost-

_**-**__**スクライド**__**-**_

Ranma groaned in utter pain as he opened his eyes and slowly took stock of the situation. He was lying face down in the dirt, and it felt like someone had decided to put his vital organs and limbs into a wood chipper and then insert them back into his body. He was almost certain that his heart had exploded the way it had been beating like crazy, and his entire head was one big pounding ache. The pain was such that he almost fell unconscious again, but he fought to remain awake. At first glance, the ground beneath him was dusty and dirty. There was little light, and as he looked up, gritting his teeth and fighting off a fresh burst of pain, it seemed as if dusk was settling over the area. His eyes slowly focused as he sat up and he was able to take in their surroundings.

There were rock formations in the distance, and a notable lack of healthy plant life in the immediate area. The sky was dark with rain clouds, and it was only because of the tiny sliver of light that came from the western horizon that he was able to see at all. There was absolutely no sign of civilization in any direction.

The most prominent landmark was the huge mountain range in the distance. It looked more like the result of the ground exploding upwards than a mountain to Ranma's eyes, but the size was right so he decided to label them as such. There were more rocks jutting out in other directions, but none of them were close. His eyes fell across two dark shapes in the dirt and he was able to recognize them as the lifeless forms of Nabiki and Ryouga. Their clothes were torn in various places, but it wasn't enough to render them completely worthless. What they had on their backs would have to do until they had something else.

And it was then that Ranma chose to try and remember what had happened leading up to that event.

'_Gosunkugi and some weird magic book… the magic book possessing him… and then some kind of blue vortex…'_

He shook his head. The last thing he'd seen before the portal closed was Akane, screaming as she tried to reach for him. As they were carried further away, pain had exploded all over his body; his head was simultaneously throbbing and stinging, and all of his nerves felt like they were on fire before there was a sudden sensation of crashing into something incredibly hard. The combined stress on their bodies had knocked them all out for some time, from what he could see.

Ranma winced as pain shot through his hands and he grimaced as he looked down at them, twitching as they were. If the torture in that vortex had continued, he could tell that they'd all have been ripped apart.

'_We were lucky we survived at all…'_ His thoughts suddenly took on a grim tone as he considered that. _'__**If **__we survived… though this doesn't look like any kind of afterlife I've heard of…'_ He struggled to rise from his sitting position and slowly made his way over to where both Ryouga and Nabiki were lying, motionless. Just as he stood over them, the two of them groaned and started moving on their own.

"Did somebody get the license plate of the 18 wheeler that hit me?" Nabiki groaned as she sat up. "Because we're definitely suing…"

"Heh. I don't think that'll help us right now." Ranma said with a chuckle, and it was at then that the other two teens noticed their surroundings.

Ryouga looked around in confusion at the world around them as Nabiki considered Ranma's words.

"Don't think it'll help, Saotome?" the middle Tendouu sister asked, amused. "Trust me, it will…" she trailed off as she took in the barren wasteland around them. "…As soon as we get home, that is." She slowly surveyed their surroundings as Ryouga stood up, dusting himself off.

"Ranma, what the hell happened?" Ryouga asked, as he looked at his rival, confusion evident on his face.

Ranma stared at him.

'_Poor porker must be really addled,' _The pig-tailed teen thought with a shake of his head. "Gosunkugi somehow managed to come up with a spell book. An _evil_ spell book, and it possessed him. He did some freaky magic and we got sucked up into that vortex. Remember?"

"Eh…" Ryouga grunted as he looked around, and Ranma wasn't sure whether or not to take that as a positive or a negative.

"And now we're somewhere that _isn't_ the street in front of my house," Nabiki growled, calling Ranma's attention over to her. "When I get my hands on that boy…"

There was a glint in her eyes that rubbed Ranma the wrong way, so he nervously looked back at the lost boy instead, glad that it was not he who would be at the receiving end of her ire.

"You know where we are, P-chan?"

Ryouga grimaced but ignored the jibe. The fanged boy looked around and stopped as his gaze fell upon the huge rocks in the distance. His eyes lingered on them before turning to Ranma.

"You ever seen that before?" He asked.

Ranma shook his head.

"I figured _you'd_ know. A landmark that big should be famous, don't you think?"

Nabiki turned to look at what they were talking about.

"I'd tend to agree," She said with a frown. "There's no way something that big and unusual could go unnoticed."

Ryouga frowned.

"Well, I've never even seen anything _like_ that before." He said.

"Wow, even Ryouga's never been here before. _Wonderful_," Nabiki commented snidely as she shakingly stood up. "Some weirdo hits us with a magic whammy and now we're not even on Earth."

The three of them all shuddered as a strong sense of déjà vu settled over them. Ryouga was the first to shake it off and continue.

"Eh, it's not so bad," Ryouga snorted. "Happens all the time, doesn't it?"

"Yeah, _about that_, Ryouga…" Ranma started, looking at his sometimes-friend warily.

"You two are unreasonably calm," Nabiki noted.

"It can't be any worse than anything that's happened before," Ranma reminded her.

"Not to _me_." The other teen remarked, sighing with a hand covering her face.

"Oh yeah," Ryouga looked over to her. "You're the type who usually just sits on the side, aren't you…"

"There could be _dinosaurs_ here for all we know." Nabiki said, ice creeping into her voice.

"Well then, in that case, I guess you're t-rex food. Ryouga and I, on the other hand, will make it just fine," the pig-tailed martial artist continued. "Isn't that right, Ryouga?"

Ryouga took a few steps away, looking around.

"There are no dinos," He announced after a moment. "I'd know."

Ranma and Nabiki gave pause to that but the lost boy merely continued.

"Anyway, we're wasting time just standing around. I've been lost enough to know that the only time you don't spend moving, you spend sleeping. Otherwise, you die. Of starvation, dehydration, exhaustion, whichever one kills you first."

"Eh… That's true," Ranma agreed. "But we can't exactly just pick a direction and go. We could end up getting even more lost. It'd be just our luck to go one direction for thirty kilometers and keel over when a big city was three away in the opposite direction."

"Well then what would you have us do?" Nabiki asked, finally calm enough to see the value in deferring to the martial artists' experience with traveling.

"We should search the area for signs of civilization," Ranma suggested. "You know, a path, a road. Maybe some ruins. That sort of thing."

"That could take too long." Ryouga said, shaking his head. "We could be too far out to find something like that, and then what? We'll have wasted time looking for something that isn't there. We should focus on looking for water, food, and a place to stay, in that order."

"True," Ranma admitted. "We can search once we've got those things down." He looked over at the horizon. "Let's go. Sun's not wastin' any time."

"Which way should we go, anyway?" Nabiki asked as she looked at Ryouga. The lost boy opened his mouth to speak as thunder crackled in the distance. He shut his mouth as a sudden chill filled the air and Ranma groaned, looking up at the cloudy gray skies.

"Just great," the boy sighed. "We just got here, and already…" The rain started pouring in thick, heady droplets, and he became a she. The red head groaned as Ryouga's own change was triggered and the lost boy became the wandering piglet. She walked over to the pile of clothes and picked them up, dropping a small black piglet onto the ground as she did so. She snickered and picked up the disoriented animal, shoved him into his own shirt like it was a bag, and slung it over her shoulder.

"Well, worst comes to worst, we have food." Nabiki sighed.

The pig started squirming at that and Ranma rolled her eyes, tightening her hold on the shirt so that he could not run off and get lost.

"She's joking, Ryouga." Ranma assured him. The pig seemed to calm down after that, and Ranma looked over at Nabiki. "So you knew about him?"

The other girl didn't seem to notice the question, and instead finally picked a direction and started walking against the storm. Ranma followed her just as the wind picked up, whipping their clothes and hair. Her pigtail held, but just barely, as they began their trek in what they all hoped was the right direction.

-スクライド-

An open top jeep blazed through the wilds, and inside could be seen two young men. The driver wore a hooded raincoat, but the other one didn't seem to mind the rain at all as it poured into the car. Said young brunette was reclining in his position on the left side of the jeep, with his chair leaning back and his feet propped up on the dashboard. He wore a long-sleeved maroon shirt under a midnight blue jacket that notably lacked a right sleeve. On his left shoulder he wore metallic shoulder protector, and on his right hand he wore a navy blue fingerless glove. He stretched his arms high over his head, then folded them behind it as they sped along the wilderness, leaving muddy tracks in their wake.

"You're such a _weenie_." He teased.

The driver grit his teeth. His only visible feature was his face, and half of that was covered with thick goggles to help him see in the rain. He absently wiped off the accumulated water as he responded.

"Don't laugh at me because I don't want to catch some kind of disease."

"A little water won't hurt you." The brunette insisted as he looked up at the thick clouds. Lightning flashed far off, and not seconds later thunder followed.

"Right, Kazuma. I seem to remember about a month ago when you were so sick you couldn't work for _two whole weeks_-"

"It was a _viral infection_." the brunette reminded him, turning his attention to the driver for a brief moment. "Or that's what Kanami said anyway. It _wasn't_ because I was pelted with rain, alright?"

"Uh-huh." The driver rolled his eyes as he switched on the lights. There was a thick mist forming around them, and with the sky also rapidly darkening, visibility had finally dropped down to the point where he needed the assistance. They didn't help him as much as he'd hoped; all they managed to do was make the fog in front of them brighter. Kimishima sighed as he slowed down.

_**-**__**スクライド**__**-**_

Ranma contorted her face as she marched on through the relentless, freezing cold rain and the intense wind that raged against her. She bent forward further to reduce her wind resistance as she finally began to realize the scope of the storm they were facing.

'_We've got to get inside somewhere, or we'll freeze to death!_' She thought with a wince. She stopped walking as she heard a droning noise off to the side. She looked up and saw some light in the distance moving at a high speed. Her eyes widened as she recognized the twin beams as belonging to a car.

"Nabiki!" She called out. The older girl did not seem to hear her at all and instead continued walking. Ranma frowned and prepared to call out again when suddenly the girl in front of her fell forward. The red head's eyes widened and she ran over to the other girl, calling her name. She turned the teen over and saw that her eyes were shut, and she wasn't moving. "Damn!"

She looked up and noticed the car in the distance was getting to the point where it would only start getting further away. She picked up the comatose girl and frantically bounded off towards the lights despite the icy winds biting at her.

"_Hey! __**Wait!**_"

-スクライド-

Kazuma narrowed his eyes.

"You hear that, Kimishima?" The brunette asked. He was now clutching his shoulders and shivering under a spare coat that the driver had left under the seat.

"Hear what?" The driver asked, sparing a glance at his partner.

"Slow down!" The brunette shouted as he started looking around. He stood up in his seat as the car slowed down. Suddenly, a red haired girl landed on the front of the jeep, surprising both of them.

"Oh man, I never thought you guys would stop!" She called out to them.

"W-what the heck was that? Who are you, falling out of the sky on us like that? You an Alter user?" Kimishima demanded.

The red head looked confused at that for a brief moment before shrugging.

"Look, my friend is hurt," The girl said, and for the first time, both boys noticed that she was carrying another girl under one arm, and a bundle of clothes under the other arm. "You guys know where some shelter is or something?"

"Yeah, hop in," Kazuma commanded as he sat back down. The girl didn't need to be told twice and she did just that, landing in the back compartment. She set down her passenger and the bundle of clothes, and glanced up as the car sped off. "You lost or something? How long have you guys been out here?" Ranma glanced at the black pig and then went back to watching over the other girl.

"…You could say that. We've been out here for a while, since the sun went down."

"That was a while ago," The driver noted.

Kazuma took his coat off and handed it to the red head.

"Here."

She looked at him in surprise for a moment, but quickly accepted it and put it over the other girl.

"Thanks a lot." She said, looking up at him.

He waved it off.

"I can take a little bit of water." He said.

"I seem to remember you saying something to that effect earlier." the driver snorted.

"Eh…heh heh…" The brunette idly scratched his head.

"How much longer till we get there?" The redhead asked.

"Shouldn't be long now. We're almost there, I think." Kimishima responded.

"Hey," Kazuma turned around and looked at her from his chair. "What're your names?"

"Eh? Oh, I'm Saotome Ranma, and this is Tendouu Nabiki," She said, motioning her unconscious companion. "Sorry about all this."

"Naw, it's cool," he nodded. "I'm Kazuma, and this is Kunihiko Kimishima."

"Nice to meetcha." Ranma replied.

"Heh, yea-AHH!" He shouted out as the car sped over a huge bump in the road. "Kimishima, you idiot!"

"Ah, sorry about that, I can't see the road very well." The driver laughed nervously as he turned the key, turning his car off. "But we're here, so come on."

Ranma looked up as the two guys got out and saw a rickety building covered in vines and other various forms of plant life, and a fairly large tree off to the side. Some of the windows on the second story were quite broken, and Ranma could imagine how flooded those rooms would be if it wasn't for the wooden boards that covered them from the inside. The redhead lifted the older girl up out of the vehicle and leapt out, following the two young men into the building.

Once inside, she was able to see that the place had the look of a health clinic. The first room was obviously a waiting room. It had a white board that was written on, and several old, dusty looking pictures hung up on the walls. There were several doors that led further into the clinic, but Ranma didn't know which one led to a place where they could care for Nabiki.

"Where's the doctor, anyway?" Ranma asked as she looked around frantically. "Hey! Is there someone in?"

"Doctor?" Kazuma looked over at his friend in confusion as the other man took off his heavy coat, and a somewhat less heavy dark green coat underneath to reveal an orange shirt.

"Oh, damn…" Kimishima looked at the red-haired girl sheepishly. "Uh, My friend lives here, there isn't really a doctor here."

"What? Oh… where can we _find_ a doctor?" She asked.

Kimishima looked surprised.

"You'd have to go to the city for that, and it's way too far away. There's medical supplies and stuff here, though, so we should be able to treat her."

"Kazu-kun?"

The three of them looked to the side and saw a small girl poking her head out of one of the doors.

"You're back!" She joined them in the room and finally noticed Ranma. "Kazu-kun, who's this?"

Ranma took in the small child's appearance; the orange long sleeved shirt that was too big and had to be folded up, a grey skirt that stopped at her knees, long orange socks and some worn orange and white sneakers. She had incredibly long light-brown hair that was done up in a ponytail with a pink ribbon, and Ranma found herself wondering if it had ever been cut in the child's life.

"Ah, this is…err…" The brunette trailed off and Ranma frowned.

"I had the decency to remember your name," the redhead said somewhat irritatedly. "Kazuma."

"I remember your name," The boy snapped. "It was uh…Ranna… Or somethin'…"

"Ran_ma_," The girl corrected. "But that's not important. My friend…" She looked down at the small child, distraught. "Is there anyone around who can help? She collapsed in the storm."

"We need to warm her up," the girl insisted, walking through the doorway that led to the stairs. "Come on," she called to the red head. "You two guys stay down here."

"Uh, okay?" Kazuma blinked and Kimishima sighed as he walked over to a cushioned bench and sat on it. The cushions were quite raggedy with age and had numerous tears and holes, but it was good enough for him.

Upstairs, the two girls carried Nabiki into a room, where they laid Nabiki on a tattered bed beneath a window. The window had been boarded up, and the only light source in the room was the dingy looking light bulb that hung from the ceiling by a wire. Ranma quickly noticed that the walls had a few holes in some places. The whole place looked like it hadn't seen maintenance in years, if not _decades_. It had a desolate, rustic feeling to it.

"You live here alone with those two guys?" Ranma asked as the small girl walked into the room holding several towels. "Er, what are those for?"

"I only live with Kazu-kun, and he's usually only here at the end of the day." The girl sighed. "We need to get her out of those clothes and dry her off before we can effectively help her."

"Oh, right," Ranma said dumbly as she accepted the towel. She stared at the thing blankly as those words replayed through her mind. "Uh, listen, I don't think it would be a good idea if I helped her undress," Ranma said nervously as she turned to look at the other girl. The brown haired child gave her a look of confusion. "Uh, er… it's complicated," Ranma blushed and the small girl shrugged.

"…Um, Okay." The girl said with a look that indicated she didn't understand. "Then would you just prefer to watch?"

"Er… actually…"

Ranma chuckled.

"Um… okay… then why don't you turn around while I get to work?"

"…Yeah…" Ranma nodded and did just that. She started fidgeting nervously, as she soon became vastly aware that a teenager who was actually much closer to being a fully grown woman than a girl was being undressed in her vicinity. "So uh… what's your name?"

"Kanami Yuta." the girl said simply as she worked. "Yours is just Ranma?"

"Ranma Saotome." the girl corrected. "Her name is Nabiki Tendou, and I have another friend who might show up soon. How old are you, again?"

"I'm…Eight?"

Ranma frowned; it sounded as if she was genuinely unsure.

"And you live alone with that Kazuma guy?" She whistled. "Must be rough."

"Things work out for us. It's much better than before…" The girl said.

"Huh? Before?" Ranma turned around and her eyes widened before she snapped back to face the other direction. The Tendou girl had been almost completely nude at the moment, and was only clothed in her panties, which Ranma had been quick to note were a bit less conservative than she'd have cared to know.

"Towels, please." The younger girl said suddenly as Ranma hastily tried to clear her mind.

Ranma complied by shutting her eyes and turning, handing the dry towels she'd been holding to the small child. As soon as they were taken she stiffly turned back around, and after a few more minutes the girl announced that she was done.

"You can turn around now," she said.

Ranma did so and noted with relief that Nabiki was under a warm blanket with her head on a pillow. "Do you have any other clothes for her to wear? She will need some more when she wakes up, these are wet and the weather isn't suitable to hang anything out right now."

"Oh…" Ranma looked at the clothes; a pair of khaki colored short-shorts and a black shirt. They were soaked and torn, as were her undergarments (Ranma blushed again upon spotting those) and would definitely not be suitable to be worn again. "I don't… I don't suppose there's anything that Kazuma guy has…" She looked over at Nabiki and then frowned. "Then again, I don't know if she could wear that…"

"Kazu-kun's clothes might not fit her right," The girl said with a frown. "Her chest is too big. He wears weird stuff too."

"Eheh, yeah, I guess they might…stretch… the fabric… Uh, anyway," Ranma said, trying to think of something else in a hurry. "There's nothing, though?"

"Hmm…well there might be…" The girl had a thoughtful look on her face for a few seconds before she seemed to realize something. "I'll be right back. I know where some clothes are," She said as she walked away.

Ranma looked down at herself and noticed the various rips and tears in her own clothes, before scowling.

"This was my favorite shirt, too…" She suddenly remembered how they had gotten there, which was what had lead to their clothes being torn in the first place. "That's right. Now that we've found civilization, we should find out where we are and try to go back to Nerima."

Kanami suddenly walked back into the room carrying a box bigger than herself. The top flaps had been torn off, and Ranma could see that inside were a lot of folded up clothes. She glanced at the small girl, noticing the small muscles on her arms for the first time before looking down at the box.

'_That's gotta weigh a lot for a little girl. Wonder if she works out?'_ she thought, looking the girl over as she set the box down next to the bed.

"She should be able to pick something from inside here." Kanami said with a smile.

Ranma looked in and noticed that the clothes looked fairly old and dingy, but they weren't in too bad of a shape. She noticed a maroon T-shirt and black pants, then smirked and took them out for herself. The pants were jeans she noticed, but that wasn't too bad. They weren't as maneuverable as her old kung-fu pants, but they would do.

'_At least I don't have to change my color scheme.'_ She found a pair of boxers her size easily enough, and looked down at Kanami.

"Is there somewhere I can change? This stuff is wet and torn up," Ranma said. "I'm surprised those guys downstairs weren't ogling me…" She muttered.

"Sure, there's a bathroom just over here." The girl said as she led her out of the room and into a hallway.

At the end of the hallway that was furthest from them was the top of the stairs. Between their end of the hallway and its opposite, there were two doors on Ranma's right. The third door to her immediate right was the one they had just come out of. Kanami led the way to the last door and opened it to reveal a large bathroom that looked the same as in every other clinic. Ranma thanked her before she walked into the room and turned on the light as the door shut. She tried to turn the hot water on, but all she got was cold water from each side. She growled and looked down at the western style toilet with a frown.

"I hate doin' this as a girl," she mumbled.

After she relieved herself, she washed her hands in the cold water with some watered down soap from the old, shoddy dispenser on the wall and changed her clothes. The red shirt fit loosely and hung below her waist, which was good because it would probably also fit her male form, and the black jeans were a little longer than they should have been, which also would probably be fixed with her male form. The waist was a bit wider than she'd thought as well, but once she zipped them up and fastened the button they didn't fall past her hips.

She frowned as she looked down at her hips disdainfully; although they were definitely attractive and useful for tricking guys into giving her things, they had no place being on her body. She sighed and looked through her old silk shirt and black pants; they were damaged beyond repair – that, she could now easily see since she was no longer wearing them.

-スクライド-

"I wonder where this little guy came from."

Kimishima was held up a small black piglet that had a bandana tied around its neck.

"I think it was with Ranna," Kazuma said absently. He was leaning against a wall with his hands folded up behind his head as he waited.

"Kanami knows how to skin a pig, doesn't she?" Kimishima asked as he held the pig up. The thing immediately started squirming in his hands and leapt to the ground.

"Yeah." The brunette said as he watched it. The pig was watching both of them warily with an awareness that Kimishima felt looked wrong on an edible creature. Seconds later, Kanami and Ranma descended from the stairs and walked out into the waiting room. Kazuma and Kimishima both looked up at the two girls who were at the end of their own conversation.

"…ould be just fine, it looks like she was only exhausted," the child said as she stopped inside the room.

Ranma was visibly relieved.

"That's good…"

"I'll watch her just in case." The younger girl said as she went back upstairs. Ranma nodded, then looked over at the piglet, and as soon as it noticed her it flew at her with a single leap. She blinked and snatched it out of the air by reflex, and held it up by the bandanna.

"Man, that is one agile pig," Kazuma said as he rubbed his head. "Where the heck did you get it anyway? Didja steal it or something, Ramna?"

"Ranma." the girl corrected with a frown. "And no, I didn't steal him. He's an old… friend. It's complicated and I won't get into it unless I have to, but anyone who hurts him has to answer to me." she said.

"Damn, that means no pork tonight…" Kimishima frowned at that. "Well then, Ranma-san, would you mind telling us more about yourself?"

"Oh? Uh, sure, why not… I'm from the Nerima district, specifically Furinkan… um, I'm the heir to the Anything Goes style of martial-arts."

"Really? Wow…" Kazuma had a look of awe about him as he stared up at her. "Where's Nerima again?"

"Y-you don't know?" Ranma stared at him with a look of surprise.

"I've never heard of it, either." Kazuma said with a far off look.

"It sure isn't a part of the Lost Ground, or I'd know where it was," Kimishima said as he looked up at Ranma from his position on the bench.

"I guess we're really lost," Ranma frowned as she looked down at the pig. "This wouldn't happen to be your fault, would it?" The pig gave a seemingly indignant snort at that and Ranma rolled her eyes.

"So, you're lost here in the Lost Ground, eh?" Kazuma asked with a smirk.

"_The Lost Ground_…" Ranma repeated, frowning. "_I've_ never heard of _that_. What is this, America?"

Both Kimishima and Kazuma stared at her.

"Never heard of it? You serious?"

"Err…" Ranma looked at Kazuma, who'd spoken up. "Well, I guess you could say I never really paid attention in class or anything. I used to travel a lot, but still, I've never heard of this place…"

"I see…" Kimishima said with a smirk. '_Class, hmm? So you're a schoolgirl… and that means you're from a city. Since you've never heard of the lost ground, I can safely assume you're not from around here. We could get a reward for taking this girl home…_'

He turned away and narrowed his eyes.

'_I'm sure some city people would pay a lot for a lost child, even if she is a runaway or something. All I need to do is find out where this Nerima place is, and we're in business. Until then, it'd be best if she stayed where I could keep an eye on her…hmm…_' He looked at Kazuma out of the corner of his eyes, and the other teen blinked as he noticed. "Kazuma, could I talk to you real fast?"

"Uh, sure," Kazuma said, as they both stood up.

"We'll only be a minute," Kimishima said with a smile as Ranma gave them a questioning look. The two walked over through one of the clinic doors and Ranma shrugged.

She walked back up the stairs and down the hall to the room where Nabiki was being kept. As she entered the room, she noticed the other girl was still lying in the bed, apparently asleep, with the young child watching over her from an old metal chair. Kanami turned her head as Ranma entered the room and looked up at her.

"Your friend should be waking up soon, I think," Kanami said with a smile.

"Ah, yeah." Ranma grabbed another chair and sat beside the girl as she set P-chan down on the ground beside them. "You said earlier that you lived alone with Kazuma, right?" Ranma asked the younger girl as she looked down at her. At the girl's nod, she continued. "Why? Where are your parents?" She asked, confused.

The girl's cheerful expression faded at that and she looked away.

"O-oh. Oh man, I'm sorry," Ranma said, realizing almost immediately what it meant. "Man, that's gotta suck."

"…It's been so long since I last saw them, I can hardly remember their faces." Kanami said with a wistful smile. "All I can remember is an… emotion."

"An emotion?" Ranma asked.

"I don't know how to explain it."

"I see…" Ranma said with a nod.

"Kazuma makes me feel the same way, although he's more like a big brother…"

"Oh yeah," Ranma started. "Now that you say that, how did you run into him?"

"We met on a rainy day, just like this one…"

-スクライド-

Kazuma grinned at his most prominent business partner as the two stood in one of the clinic's empty rooms.

"So all I have to do is offer to put them up," He began.

Kimishima nodded excitedly.

"…while you look for a way to get them home."

Kimishima nodded excitedly again.

"And once the city gets them, we'll have money growing off of trees." He finished, with Kimishima nodding even more enthusiastically. Kazuma's grin faded and was replaced by a skeptical look. "…It'll never work."

Kimishima's jaw dropped and he stared at his partner in confusion.

"What do you mean it'll never work?" Kimishima demanded. "It's foolproof!"

"I can already think of so many ways that it all goes wrong and blows up in our faces," Kazuma said with a sigh as he walked away. "They could be alter criminals. Or even worse, we could get charged with kidnapping them, and then _I'll_ be an alter criminal! I don't want to get involved with HOLY, Kimishima. Those guys are nothing but trouble."

"Come on, Kazuma! In the first case, we'll be heroes for turning them in, and in the second one, they could convince them that we _didn't_ kidnap them!"

"Not if they don't like us they won't. And like I said, I won't get involved with HOLY, whether it's turning in criminals or becoming one myself!" Kazuma said, turning to look at his partner with a frown. "What am I supposed to do about Kanami if something happens to me? She's just a little _girl. _I can't just leave her alone and play around with those HOLY bastards. Not unless they throw the first punch," Kazuma added the last part on a whim.

"Oh come on, Kazuma, my plans always work!"

"Yeah, right," Kazuma snorted. "And my right arm is made of glass."

"Just give me a week, Kazuma. A week, and then you can kick them out! But just give me that!"

"Kimishima…" Kazuma sighed and shook his head. "Fine. Whatever. You get seven days."

"All right! You won't be disappointed, Kazuma!" The brunette rolled his eyes and walked out of the room. "Now then, all I have to do is a little investigating… Nerima, hmm. Sounds familiar, maybe it's one of the more prominent cities? Oh man, this is really gonna turn a profit, you just watch Kazuma, we'll have our pockets lined with money before the week's over!"

Kazuma just shook his head with an exasperated sigh.

-スクライド-

Upstairs, Kazuma leaned on a doorsill with his arms crossed. Both Kanami and Ranma were sitting up, watching the other girl sleep.

"Yo," He said. Both girls turned to look at him and he waved with one hand. "Hey, Ranna,"

"_Ranma_," Ranma said with a frown.

"Ran_ma_," Kazuma said, frowning as well, but at himself. "I'm starting to sound like Cougar…" He muttered to himself. "Uh, anyway, Ranma, I just wanted to tell you, our place is open for as long as you need to stay. My friend said he'd look into that place called Nerima for you, but I'm not sure what he'll find."

"…Thanks." Ranma smiled gratefully at the other boy, who looked away and shrugged.

"S'nothin'."

"Kazu-kun…" Kanami looked up at her older brother figure with a smile on her face.

"Didn't I tell you not to call me that…" He started with a groan.

"Kazu-kun, I figured you'd kick them out as soon as it stopped raining," She said. "I'm sorry I thought so low of you. I was wrong."

Kazuma felt a vein pop somewhere and turned around further before coughing.

"Ahem. Ah, yeah, well… it's almost bed time, Kanami. Go get ready."

And with that, he walked away, leaving the two girls alone.

"Don't let us keep you up," Ranma said tiredly. She knew it was late, but she couldn't see anything resembling a clock in the room they were in.

"I'll see you in the morning then, Saotome-san." The girl said brightly, although Ranma could see the tiredness in her eyes.

"Erm, please don't call me that… just Ranma is fine…" The red-head said, slightly embarrassed. _'Oh man, if we do have to end up staying here for a while, I'm gonna have to end up showin' them…'_ She thought.

"Ah, okay then. Goodnight, Ranma-chan!" Kanami said, just as brightly as before, while she walked out through the door.

Ranma's face twitched and she chuckled to herself.

"Oh, the irony…" She sat in her chair and looked down at P-chan, who was, unsurprisingly, already asleep, and sighed deeply. "Oh boy…"

-_**Gray Skies Part 1: End**_-


	2. Somewhere, Sometime

_-Nerima, Tokyo. Thursday, November 2nd, 1989-_

"No! Ranma!" Akane slammed her fists on the asphalt in a futile attempt to get at her fiancé and sister.

"Hahahaha… They are long gone, you fool!" Gosunkugi laughed as the girl started crying. "Their bodies were shredded apart by the centrifugal forces of the vortex! Hahahaha!"

"Vile creature," Kuno spat out. "With the righteous blade of Clan Kuno, I shall end you!" He took his bokken by the hilt and pulled on it as if unsheathing an actual katana, and to both Gosunkugi and Akane's great surprise, he did just that. A silver blade glowed with a bright, white light, and the very air around it hummed softly.

"Hmph, a simple magical blade will not be enough to defeat me," the possessed sorcerer spat out. "You will perish as easily as your friends did!"

"Akane Tendou," Kuno said. "I would ask you to leave this to me and get to safety, but to do so at this point would be denying you your revenge."

Akane looked up at the samurai wannabe as tears coursed down her face.

"We can not afford to hold ourselves in check. That creature is not the boy we knew any longer. I fear that his essence has been eroded away so that the true monster can take his body."

Akane slowly stood up and nodded at that.

"You're right," She said as she shakily stood up to face the monster. "He has to be destroyed."

Kuno nodded at that, satisfied that they had an understanding and both turned to face the floating monster.

"You are deluding yourselves. If Saotome could not defeat me, then the two of you, who are merely fodder compared to him, have no hope of survival. This is no contest!"

"The Kuno Clan blade was forged especially to defeat evils such as yours," the boy spat as his blade's silver aura grew brighter. "Have at thee, cretin!"

Both Akane and Kuno charged as one; Kuno with his blade held back, and Akane a glowing bonfire of sickly green energy. Kuno swung upwards with his sword, releasing a white wave of energy that shot at the demon. The monster snorted and held up a hand, summoning a black portal that swallowed the attack as it had Ranma's, before vanishing. With another gesture, the second, larger portal appeared.

"Hmph, fool. The Kuno Clan blade can not be destroyed by its own power." Kuno calmly held up his sword, and as the incredibly large crescent of energy flew at them, his sword absorbed it, and its aura grew visibly larger, the blade growing to match his own height.

"Insolent _mortal!_ You were planning that!" The creature screamed in anger. "I will _eradicate_ you!"

"Abominable Devil, your death was assured the moment you took up arms against me!" Kuno declared as Akane leapt up at the monster, her fist glowing with green and purple energy.

Gosunkugi, or what was left of him, looked up at her in surprise as she hovered in the air just over him for a moment.

"_Die!_" She shrieked as she slammed her fist into its face, sending it flying down into the ground almost mach speed. The monster crashed into the street, crushing the pavement beneath him as he dug a crater. The sorrow-powered girl fell back down to the ground with a look of absolute hatred on her face, and a steady stream of tears flowing down her cheeks.

Gosunkugi growled and stood up, apparently unhurt by the ordeal. The red book had followed him down to the ground and remained connected by its red tendril.

"I underestimated you pests, but no more," the monster spat as it raised a hand. Large chunks of concrete and asphalt broke off of the street and flew at both Kuno and Akane with the intent to crush them both, but the martial artists dodged. He raised his other hand and Akane barely dodged the lightning bolt that followed. Without pause, the demon raised both arms into the air and both were covered in swirling fire. He lowered them and pointed at the sword wielding teen, shooting off an intense, concentrated stream of fire at him.

Kuno jumped to the side, and started running when he realized that the dark creature was still pumping the beam with energy and following him with the attack. As he ran, Akane noticed the ground where the beam of fire had hit was a bright, red-orange color, and that the asphalt around it was melting.

'_That would have vaporized Kuno,'_ She realized with dread. Finally, the demon stopped as it realized it would not hit them with such a slow moving attack and snarled at them.

"Insolent humans, brace yourselves for ultimate power!" He bellowed as he was suddenly surrounded by a corona of black energy.

-スクライド-

Disclaimer: None of the series, characters, or locations mentioned in this story are owned by the author of this story unless stated otherwise.

GRAY SKIES

-Chapter 2: Somewhere, Sometime-

-スクライド-

As Nabiki slowly woke, she found herself in a strange bed, in a strange room, with Saotome sleeping in a chair, facing her. She quickly noticed her state of dress, and was already mentally calculating how much money the pig-tailed wonder owed her for whatever jollies he'd gotten out of looking at her.

Then, the previous day came back to her all at once in a flash; Gosunkugi, a hellish blue world, some odd wilderness, biting wet coldness. It was then that Nabiki realized that Ranma had probably saved her life. She knew enough about first aid to know that people suffering from hypothermia, which it might have looked like to Ranma, needed to be warmed up and insulated. Her clothes, wet and cold as they were, would have been counter productive to getting her body temperature back to normal, and Ranma had undressed her out of necessity to save her.

As she looked around, she was able to see that they were in some sort of rundown building; the walls had a few holes that no one even bothered to cover up, the window was boarded up, and the only light bulb in the room was hanging from the ceiling by its wire. There was nothing to cover it either, so anyone reaching up high enough would have been able to get the bulb out with minimal effort. She noticed a large cardboard box next to Ranma, filled to the brim with clothes.

A quick glance at the red haired girl told her that she was wearing clothes that had come out of the box. The Tendou girl snorted at her choice of clothing; it was the same color scheme as before, and very unoriginal. The teen slowly sat up as she realized that Ranma wasn't going to wake up all of a sudden.

"Hmm…" An evil smirk settled on her face as she toyed with the idea of getting up and getting dressed without sending the neo-girl out of the room.

In the end, she'd decided to do just that. She took her time through the ordeal; at first looking for her own clothes, only to be disappointed when she found them and realized they would not function well enough at all, and then when going through the box to look for something that would work for her. Most of the clothes, she'd noticed, were new, with the tags and stickers still on them. The box had been labled _Hurricane Relief_, but she could not remember any recent major hurricanes or typhoons. Though it had been done with a permanent marker, most of the ink had long since faded out, which told her it had to have been _old_.

None of the clothes resembled anything she could recognize from recent fashion. They were all fairly plain, too – none of them had any elaborate company designs or expensive logos. Most of the pants were casual jeans and skirts, and the shirts were all incredibly conservative. The undergarments were at the bottom of the box, she noticed, and just as conservative as the other clothes. She settled on a simple white t-shirt and some slightly oversized blue jeans with a sigh; she'd have to get something else as soon as possible. The only pants that could be called shorts weren't at all like what she usually wore and went all the way down to her shins. They looked incredibly awkward and she wasn't even going to try wearing them.

As she checked the pig-tailed martial artist before leaving the room, she realized that the red head had slept through it all, instead of waking up and being incredibly embarrassed as per the plan. Slightly annoyed, the girl took Ranma's hair tie out of the sleeping teen's hair and put it in her pocket. From what she knew, Ranma couldn't turn back into a male without it or he'd go bald. She didn't really stop to think about how long it had been since he'd had the dragon's whisker soup at this point, though, and decided to explore whatever dump the oaf had found.

There was a hallway just outside the room, and at the end of the hall she could see the top of some stairs. As she looked into the first rooms she came across, however, she was surprised when she heard the sound of a door shutting in the distance.

A quick glance in the direction she'd heard it from told her that it had come from downstairs. Her mind went into overdrive as she started to consider possible situations; Ranma might have found an oft used abandoned shelter, or been taken in by someone else already using the place. As she noiselessly crept down the stairs to get a look at whoever else was in there, she was surprised at the sight of a little girl standing at the base of the stairs with her back turned.

The child was staring off into space with her hands at her sides and as Nabiki peered closer she noticed there was a rainbow colored aura surrounding the girl like a second skin. It was very thin and hardly noticeable, but definitely there. Deciding not to think much of it, though, she cleared her throat, which startled the child and caused her to turn around.

"Excuse me, but can you tell me where we are?" Nabiki asked as she crossed her arms. "I noticed that this place isn't exactly up to date on maintenance, and I don't think anything like it would be found in the middle of a big district or anything,"

The child blinked at her.

"Oh, you're Ranma-chan's friend," the girl said as if suddenly realizing something. "Um, well this place is called the lost ground…" She tilted her head to the side. "I'm not sure what you mean when you say district, though…" The girl said, sounding a little lost. "Sorry…"

"I see." Nabiki sighed. Apparently they were in some rural community that had probably once been connected to society. _'__I do__ubt__ she'll know where Nerima is either__. __At least we're still in Japan. I can't think of any other countries where everything is marked in Japanese__.'_ She thought sourly. "When we get back to Nerima, Gosunkugi will _pay_… just have to figure out how much…" She looked over at the little girl again. "Say, little girl, can you tell me what prefecture we're in, at least?" Ranma asked.

"Prefecture?" The girl asked. "Um, I guess you could call it the Kana…kawa…I forgot, but no one has called the Lost Ground a prefecture for years." She tilted her head the other way. "I'm not sure…"

"Ugh," Nabiki closed her eyes, miffed at the quality of education kids got on the countryside. "Okay, sure. _Thanks_, little girl," She said.

"My name is Kanami Yuta," the girl said with a slightly put off look. "Ranma-chan told me your name last night, but I think I forgot it…" She looked apologetic at that point.

"Ranma-chan, huh… listen, when… _she_ wakes up, tell her I want to speak with her and Ryouga." She said. She paused for a moment and then looked at the girl again. "Do you have a telephone I can use?"

"Telephone..?" The girl had a blank look on her face as she considered the word.

"Nevermind." Nabiki said shaking her head. "Man, definition of country bumpkin."

-スクライド-

Ranma blinked several times as she slowly regained her senses. There was an irritating, cold and somewhat itchy sensation on the side of her mouth that she immediately recognized as partially dried up drool. She slowly sat up and wiped her mouth off as she looked around in confusion.

"I must have fallen asleep. Oh well, she still hasn't…" Ranma looked down and noticed that Nabiki was not present in the bed. "…Uh…"

"Ranma-chan, are you awake yet?" Ranma instantly recognized the young girl's voice from the night before and turned around, looking at the door.

"Oh, hey there…"

"…Um, Ranma-chan… Your hair is all messed up. You might want to go look in the mirror," The younger girl said. "Breakfast should be ready in half an hour. Your friend is already awake and waiting for you and someone called _Ryouga_ downstairs."

"Oh, thanks," Ranma called back as the girl left. "Wait, so Nabiki woke up? That means…" Ranma recalled the girl's state as she had been put in bed and her face turned red. "Uh, Happosai in a thong, Cologne wearing a bikini –___**gahhh**_hhh why did I do that…" Ranma cringed. She looked down at the sleeping piglet by her feet and sighed.

"It's time to wake up, Ryouga." She kicked the thing harshly and was rewarded with a surprised, indignant squeal. "Come on, it's time for breakfast." She reached down and grabbed the pig, holding it level with her face, and licking her lips. The pig quickly woke up at the mention of breakfast and what she was doing with her mouth and immediately began to struggle and squirm in her grasp. "Yup, bacon and sausage, with a side of ham…"

The piglet squealed and tried to escape, but she snorted.

"Oh cut it out, I'm only kidding," She laughed as it glared at her and she walked out of the room.

-スクライド-

Ranma stared at the mirror with a frown on her face. Her hair was a complete mess, with odd ends pointing out every which way. It looked like Nabiki had thought it might be funny to take her hair out its pigtail. Ranma shrugged; it was't a big deal since it wasn't like she needed the dragon's whisker, and that had been the only reason she'd worn her hair in a braid anyway. It would be nice to go around without it for once, but she was attached to the braid and would probably put it back in later. It did serve to keep her hair out of the way in a fight, so there was a practical usage too.

'_Hmm, maybe a ponytail..? Nah…'_

She looked down at the pig on the ground and noticed it was staring at her impatiently.

"Oh yeah. Hot water." She turned the water faucet on, and was relieved when the water temperature slowly rose to a fairly warm temperature. Before splashing herself, she looked in the mirror and frowned. "Hmm. This would be awkward. I'd hate to explain something like this if we're going to leave right away…" The girl looked down at the pig, who was staring back up at her in apparent confusion. "Although they're waiting for you to show up, it would be weird if you were already in the house…"

Her eyes lit up and she nodded to herself.

"If I leave you at the door, can you promise not to try and go anywhere? Just knock on the door after I go back inside," Ranma said as she looked down at him.

Understanding dawned on the small animal and it nodded back at her.

"Right, I'll try and find you something to wear…"

The pig looked confused again, and she could tell she had to explain.

"Our clothes are torn up beyond belief, Porky. There's no way they can be saved now. I think I saw something you might like, though. There was a pink shirt in there for men— Oww! You little-!" As soon as she had started on about the pink shirt, the thing bit her ankle. "I was only joking you idiot!" The pig gave her a look that could have been interpreted as "Yeah Right". "Geez, wait here you little bastard…"

-スクライド-

Nabiki sat in a chair that had controls on the side, and could rotate, raise, lower, and lean in different directions. It was obviously a holdover from when the clinic was operational. She had one leg crossed over the other, both arms crossed over her chest, and a pensive frown on her face. Although the place figuratively reeked of disuse and neglect, it was fairly clean, and had been fashioned into a quaint little home. Although it was slightly unnerving to have vines coming out of the air-vent, and a _tree _growing inside the room she was in, the only person Nabiki had seen all morning was the little girl, and she hadn't asked about that yet.

Ranma walked into the room with most of the tangles brushed out of her hair, and looked at the other girl with a frown.

"Why'd you take my string?" She asked.

Nabiki smirked at that.

"No reason," She shrugged.

"Can I have it back then?" the red-head asked, holding out a hand expectantly.

"Sure, later." the older girl said offhandedly. "For now, where's Ryouga?"

"He's right outside. I switched him back and dropped him at the door so we wouldn't have to explain anything," the girl huffed. "We should be getting ready to leave. Why are you just sitting around?"

"Leave? No, we're staying here." the other girl said.

"What?" Ranma recoiled. "Why?"

"We don't even know where we are," Nabiki reminded her, gesturing the whole building with her arms. "The smartest thing to do would be take that kid up on her hospitality as long as possible. We're going to need to find out where the nearest major city is, go there, and then somehow get to Nerima. We might even be on another island, for all we know."

"Well sure, but if we don't find anything, we can come back," Ranma pointed out.

"Then _I'll_ stay here," Nabiki said, crossing her arms. "While you guys search for a way out of this place."

Ranma sighed.

"But that would just take longer." He said. "We'd have to come back for you if we found a lead."

"From where _I_ stand, that makes it easier," Nabiki drawled. "I'm not super fit like you guys. I'd slow you down. You can cover more ground."

Ranma frowned. She had a point.

"Anyway, we're going to need money." Nabiki said. "You guys might be able to swim home, but I can't. Never mind drowning from exhaustion, I can't fight off sharks or the like. So if we _are_ on another island, I'd need to get enough money to fly home – which Gosunkugi will reimburse me for in _full_. Now, I could get that on my own from bank accounts, but it won't be easy without the proper identification, and would still end up taking a while. Our families could wire us money, too, but that might not be easy either."

"Hmm…" Ranma frowned at that. "Well, okay. I guess we'll stay here. But you know how hard that'll be for Ryouga."

"Ryouga travels all the time. As soon as he gets something approaching a travel pack, he'll be fine on his own. He might even make it back to Nerima before us the way he goes around."

"…Yeah…" Ranma sighed. "Whatever. That guy did say we could stay here for as long as we needed."

"Guy?" Nabiki asked. "What guy?"

"Kazuma. Didn't you meet him already?" Ranma asked with a raised eyebrow.

"No. I didn't see anyone but the girl."

"Oh, well he must already be out looking for information then." The red head said. "He said he would last night."

There was a loud banging sound far off and both girls turned and blinked.

"Must be Ryouga." Ranma turned around and walked out of the room into the foyer in time to see Kanami open the door and look up at the strange boy wearing a bandana. He was wearing a black t-shirt and black jeans.

As he looked down at the girl, he blinked a few times.

"Oh, um, Is… Er, is there someone called Ranma here?" He asked nervously. "I've… been looking for… _her_… all night."

"Oh yes, come in. You must be her friend." The girl said. Ryouga didn't answer that, instead settling for silence as he followed the girl into the clinic. "She's just upstairs…" The girl blinked as she noticed Ranma standing at one of the other doors. "Oh, there she is. Good morning, Ranma-chan!" the girl said pleasantly. "You look better."

"Uh, yeah, thanks," Ranma said. She looked at Ryouga and sighed; now that it was looking like they'd stay, her plans to stay a girl and not explain Ryouga's curse had gone to waste, and looked to be doing more harm than not. "Um, Kanami-chan, I was talking with Nabiki, and she said that we would take up Kazuma's offer…"

"Oh, you will?" The girl smiled. "That's good, it's always good to have more people around the house to help out."

"Um…" Ranma blinked and turned around, giving Nabiki a very pointed, if brief, look, before turning back to look at Kanami. "Yeah, help out. Say, did Kazuma already leave?" She asked.

"Yes, Kimishima-san came early and picked him up. They're always gone this early, and tend to not get back until late at night," The girl sighed. "They did say they would be looking for information on Nerima this time, though, so maybe they're being useful for once…"

"Being useful for once?" Ranma asked curiously.

"I'll explain it while we eat, breakfast is almost ready," the younger girl promised.

"Okay," Ranma nodded and turned back around to go into the room.

Ryouga followed her wordlessly, and the two looked at Nabiki.

"You heard that, Nabiki? She thinks you're going to be useful around the house," Ranma said cheerfully.

"I've done chores before, Saotome." Nabiki said, raising an eyebrow. "I'll be lenient this time, and let that _slide_," she said as she leaned back into the chair more. "If anything, I seem to recall the ones who never did any chores at _my_ house…"

"Hey, I helped out. A little…" Ranma muttered the last bit. "She said breakfast is almost ready, let's go eat." She said as she turned around and walked out of the room.

-スクライド-

Nabiki looked in confusion at the food that was set on the western table before them. It was a completely western arrangement; there were two over-easy eggs on each plate, two strips of bacon, and fried potatoes. Both Ranma and Ryouga took it in stride, although the lost boy didn't eat his bacon and it was lost to Ranma, but it struck the young woman as odd that in _such _arural Japanese community they would eat such blatantly western style food.

She slowly began to eat it, deciding not to waste it or let it get cold.

'_Something is definitely strange about this place.' _She thought. '_Hmm. This isn't bad. Not as good as Kasumi, but far better than anything Akane's __**ever**__ made.' _

When they finished eating, it was Ranma who spoke first.

"That was good, Kanami-chan," she started, "Where did you learn to cook? Did Kazuma teach you?"

The younger girl giggled and shook her head as she gathered the dishes.

"The women at the farm all taught me what I know,"

"Farm?" Ranma asked.

Kanami nodded.

"In the day, I go there and help out with the chores, and in return they give us food. Kazu-kun does work, but it doesn't get him paid much. He's so lazy…" She sighed.

"How old is this Kazuma guy?" Nabiki asked.

"Kazu-kun is 16."

"Ah." Nabiki nodded and silently contemplated it. '_Hmm. Most guys that age can't find really good high paying jobs, but you'd think around here he'd be helping on the farm like her.' _ She shook her head and looked at the girl again. "So, when do you go to this farm?" Nabiki asked.

"Usually after breakfast, and they let me go home in the afternoon," the girl said. "But Kazu-kun usually gets home late, so we almost never play together anymore…" A lonely look had crept onto the girl's face as she talked.

The three teens shared an uncomfortable look as the girl stood up and walked over to the sink, and began to wash the dishes.

"Um, why don't you let me handle that…" Ranma said as she stood up.

"Ranma, don't you have water allergies or something?" Nabiki asked as she did the same. "I can spare a few minutes of my time to take care of some plates."

Ranma and Ryouga gawked at her, and she scowled at that.

"What? Do I have something on my face?"

"Oh… No… nothing…" Ranma looked away, and Ryouga looked everywhere but at her as he whistled noisily. Nabiki rolled her eyes and moved over to take over for the small child.

"Thank you," Kanami said gratefully as she watched the older girl work.

"Oh no, it's no problem…" Nabiki muttered without much sincerity.

"So…" Kanami went back over to the table and sat down again. "I've told you about me. What about you guys? Where are you from? What do you do?" she asked curiously.

"Ryouga and I practice martial arts," Ranma said casually.

"That's right, you haven't said much," Kanami said as she looked pointedly at Ryouga.

Ryouga blinked when he realized she was right, and purposely clenched his mouth shut as they locked eyes in a battle of wills. They stayed liked that for a good minute, until he finally blinked, and Kanami cheered.

"I'm Ryouga," He said. "I like to travel."

Ranma and Nabiki snorted at that and the boy grit his teeth.

"I'm a better martial artist than Ranma."

Ranma snorted.

"Hey Nabiki, what odds do you give me beating porky here in a fair fight?" She asked.

"Three to one," Nabiki said without missing a beat.

"_What?_" Ryouga demanded, looking at Nabiki indignantly.

"You haven't been away on some kind of whacked out training journey or learned anything new recently, so those are the odds." The other teen said with a shrug.

"Aw, come on now, let's not fight," Kanami said with a smile on her face. "If Ryouga-kun thinks he's better, then he thinks he's better,"

Ranma snorted and crossed her arms.

"Don't be immature now, you two…"

"I'm not immature, I just don't like when Ryouga tries to tell lies like that," Ranma snorted. "So misleading, the scoundrel."

"Who's lying?" the fanged boy asked dangerously, as he sat straight up.

"You are, bacon bits."

"Come on, you two…" Kanami said nervously.

"Don't do that here, you idiots," Nabiki said as she walked back over to the table, drying her hands off with a towel. "This place isn't used to what you two can throw around."

"Hmph," Ranma said as she allowed the tension to diffuse. "Well then… Kanami-chan, you said you go to a farm after you eat?"

"Oh yes, that's right," the girl said as she looked around. "It must be late, they'll wonder about me."

"We'll go with you," Ranma told her. "Then we can explain why."

"Er…" Nabiki suddenly looked ill. '_Be a farmhand? No… way…_' She shuddered. '_Just think of the smell!_' She coughed and closed her eyes, then looked over at the little girl. "Kanami-_chan_… Is there anything that needs to be done around _here?_"

"Actually, since we're not here for much, it doesn't get that messed up," Kanami said. "If you don't want to come, I understand. It's hard work, and you don't look like you're used to it."

Nabiki blinked.

"Oh, really? Err, yeah, thank you…"

"Hmph," Ryouga snorted. "Well, you don't need to worry about us. Ranma and I will definitely help you out."

"Damn straight," The red head said with a nod. "Nabiki can do whatever she wants. We'll be better off without her."

The middle Tendou girl rolled her eyes as the others stood up.

"It's not a big deal," Kanami said with a smile.

"Let's go, then," Ryouga said as he started walking towards one of the doors.

"The exit's not that way," Kanami said as he stopped at the door. She walked to the only other door in the room. "We can get out through here, there's a back door." The girl opened it and walked out, with the two teens right behind her. Ranma shut the door behind herself noisily.

Nabiki, with the frown still on her face, walked out of the kitchen.

-スクライド-

Not far from the clinic, Ranma and Ryouga took in the scenery as they walked along the dirt path with Kanami leading the way. The road was lined with plains on either side, and Ranma found herself wondering where they were going.

"Say, Kanami-chan, why didn't we use the street in front of your house?" The red head asked.

"Huh, oh it's faster to go this way. Look, we're almost there!" The girl said cheerfully as she pointed into the distance, as they crested over a hill. Both teens looked up and noticed that there was indeed a farm in the distance, with a large fenced up area that kept animals from escaping. They could also see a number of people in the distance.

"Oh…"

-スクライド-

Nabiki stood in the room where she'd been sitting earlier in the medical chair. There were several things she'd been noticing all around the clinic that she could tell had gone unused for years. Tons of boxes had been packed, and there was nothing here that she could tell was expensive or for entertainment or comfort. There were several bookstands, but they were all covered in dust with only a few books on their shelves; no televisions, no radios, or anything else of the sort. It looked for the most part like someone had been getting ready to move out, and then left their things behind.

The first box she checked out contianed more clothes. The second and third ones were full of medical books, and the one after those was halfway full with maps and technical books. After resolving to look at the maps later, she checked a fifth and final box, and found some strange, flat… plastic things inside. After pulling one out, she looked at it in mild curiosity. She could tell it was folded like a book, but it didn't look like one at all. She opened it and saw a plastic window-like screen on one side and she recognized something that resembled a keyboard on the other. Both hiragana and latin characters were present.

'_It's… a keyboard and monitor? But it's so small and thin_.' She looked around the box, but couldn't see a bulky computer tower or anything resembling one. After several minutes she gave up her search and stood up, holding the device up for closer inspection. '_Why would you connect a keyboard to a monitor? And how did they make this thing so flat?'_

There was a button with the universal symbol for power on the corner of the thing, above the keyboard, and she pressed that. Nothing major happened, but a small red light lit up above the keyboard, and as she looked at it she saw a picture beside it that resembled a battery.

'_Maybe it needs recharging,'_ She thought. '_It has been in a box for however many… years…'_

She paused to consider that.

'_This thing looks like something out of a futuristic movie or anime, and yet here it is in this run down place out in the boonies, collecting dust?' _She frowned as she mulled that over and looked inside the box again. There were several wires, but they didn't look like the usual power cords at all. They were much thinner and had a box in the middle of the wire that she recognized as a surge suppressor. She took one out and stood looked it over.

'_I guess I have to find a power outlet._' She looked around and, on seeing one walked over and plugged the device in it. She set it down and, she walked back over to the boxes and rummaged through the one with maps. When she pulled one out, she blew dust off of it, then frowned and rubbed what hadn't come off with her arm. Once it was clean, she blinked at the cover. She blinked several times.

'_Kanagawa prefecture; 2008-2009?_'

She studied the cover carefully before opening it and looking inside.

-スクライド-

Ranma fidgeted as three of the farmhands scrutinized both her and the bandana-clad boy on her side.

"They're guests staying at my house," The small child said cheerfully in way of explanation. "Their friend collapsed last night in the rain, and Kazu-kun rescued her. They're here to pay us back for our help."

"That worthless husband of yours? Saved someone?" An older, heavyset woman asked with surprise evident in her voice and face.

Ranma and Ryouga blinked at that and then looked at each other in confusion.

Kanami giggled at their interaction.

"Kazu-kun saved them," She nodded.

"Well then, if they're here to repay you for that, they can stay," the same woman said.

The younger, much thinner woman to her side nodded her agreement.

"We rarely hear good things about that Kazuma boy, and he never shows up to help." she said. "But since you're here, you can definitely pick up his slack."

"Wait." The final examiner, an older man with a pickaxe slung over his shoulder spoke up for the first time. "You people ain't _Alter Users_, are ya?" He asked suspiciously. Ranma and Ryouga only looked more confused at that, but Kanami spoke up for them.

"They haven't done anything but help me and be polite since they showed up," Kanami said.

"Well, them alter users ain't nuthin' but' trouble," the old man grumbled. "Tearin' up the countryside, thievin' an' harassin' us all they please…" He turned his head and spat. "HOLY too. They try ta fight fire with fire, and all it does is burn everyone. As long as you don't mean us any trouble, I ain't got any problem with ya'll stayin'. Make yerselves useful." He turned around and stalked off, leaving Ranma and Ryouga even more confused.

"Right, well they need a few more guys up at the construction site," the plump woman said authoritatively. "And we can always use more girls for the house chores,"

"Er, actually, I'm better doing… men's work," Ranma said suddenly.

"Nonsense," The first woman said as she took her by the arm and led her away. Ryouga snickered as Ranma continued, unsuccessfully, to try and deter the other woman.

"I'll show you where the men are working," the skinny woman said as she turned around. "They'll tell you what to do."

"Uh, okay," Ryouga nodded as he followed her. He looked back to see Kanami waving at him and waved back before turning back around to notice that the woman was gone. "Uh…" He turned around again, but Kanami was gone as well. He sighed and hunched over. "Oh boy…"

-スクライド-

Later that day, Kazuma sat in the passenger seat of his friend's car as they drove along the desolate highway back to the clinic.

"So did you find out anything about that Nerima place today?" He asked.

"You mean while you were working?" the driver asked as he glanced at the other teen. "Not really, no. It was surprising too, because the people I asked usually know that kind of stuff. Some of them owe me a few favors, so they said they'd try to dig deeper than what they already know."

"_The people you asked_, huh…" Kazuma snorted. "I don't have to guess what people those were. You sure those favors are owed to _you_? I'm the one who usually does all of the work."

"And I'm your agent," The driver said cheerfully. "We're a wonderful team."

"Right, whatever." Kazuma looked out the side at the scenery that rolled by. "We're almost there. But what do we do about Ramma? I'm sure her friend already woke up."

"Yeah, you're probably right. I hope we can convince them to stay. They might want to leave, and there's no reward in letting them wander off." The car jumped on hitting a high bump in the ground, and the car swayed a bit before stopping in front of the clinic.

Kazuma immediately opened the door and started walking towards the clinic just as Kimishima killed the engine. The brunette opened the door and walked in with a yawn.

"Yo Kanami!" the teen called out. "You back yet?" When he received no answer, he started walking to a different room just as Kimishima walked in and shut the door behind him. "Ranma! You here?" He called out as he walked into the room with the electrical-swivel chair.

"You must be Kazuma." Came a voice from the side. Kazuma's head whipped to the side and he noticed the girl from the previous day was sitting in the chair.

"Oh, and you're Ranma's friend," the boy nodded. "I guess you got better."

She raised an eyebrow at that.

"You guess?"

"Err, well…" He shrugged. "Sorta?"

"Hmm…" She looked him over and tilted her head as another man walked in behind him. "And who are you?"

The man looked at her and smiled.

"Oh, you're all better! I'm so relieved!" He exclaimed. "My name is Kimishima Kunihiko, it's a pleasure to meet you miss…"

"Tendou Nabiki," the teen said with a neutral look. The man called Kimishima visibly faltered at that.

"I-I'm sorry?" He asked.

"I'm not going to say it again," The girl said. "Unless you're willing to pay me. I don't do much for free, and someone else has used up all of my generosity for today."

"Don't do much for free?" Kazuma blinked. "Okay lady, whatever. Kimishima, I'm gonna go down to the farm and get Kanami and I'm sure Ranma's with her. I'll be back in twenty minutes or so." He waved casually as he walked back towards the front door.

"Okay, later Kazuma," the other man said offhandedly as he turned back to face Nabiki. "So your name is Nabiki Tendou, huh?" He asked. '_Tendou… Tendou… I know I've heard that name before…_' the young man, narrowed his eyes.

Nabiki just stared at him with a seemingly casual look on her face, but the man could tell she was sizing him up just as carefully. An invisible spark ignited between them, and both broke out into predatory grins.

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Ms. Tendou."

"I assure you, the pleasure is all mine, Mr. Kimishima," the young woman intoned.

-スクライド-

Kazuma jogged along the dirt path that led to the farm; it was a five minute jog, maybe six. Although he encouraged Kanami to run back with him, she wasn't quite as fit as he was and would tire much quicker. The farm was soon in view, which alerted him to how close he was. He took a left and soon came upon a rock formation that was familiar to him.

Ranma and Kanami were playing some sort of game that involved one chasing the other, and sitting on one of the large rocks was a boy clad in all black with a yellow and black bandana in his hair.

'_Wonder who that is.'_ He noticed the teen was staring off in the distance, at the large, ruined buildings that were covered with moss and other plant growth. Not stopping to think why the boy would be staring at the ruined buildings, he started walking over to join them. "Yo! Kanami!" The two girls turned at his voice and looked at him. He waved and Kanami ran over to him, jumping up and hugging him when she was close enough.

"Kazu-kun! You're back!"

"Oi, haven't I told you not to call me that?" He grumbled as he ruffled her hair without really looking at her. Ranma was walking up towards him, pulling on the new guy by his arm. "Ranma, who's this guy?"

"This is Ryouga. He's my friend, but we got separated last night. He found your place this morning though," the girl said.

"Hello," Ryouga said warmly. "I understand you've agreed to provide accommodations for my friends?" He asked.

"Yeah, that's right," Kazuma nodded with a grin. "So you guys came to help Kanami at the farm?"

They both nodded.

"Thanks for keeping an eye on her, I had to go to work. Oh yeah," He turned and looked at Ranma with a blank look. "Kimishima and I couldn't find anything about Nerima."

"You couldn't?" Ranma asked, sounding somewhat surprised. "Oh well, I guess…" She frowned. '_This place isn't exactly up to date. They probably don't know or care about anything that doesn't really affect them…'_

"Say, Kazuma-san," Ryouga started up. "I was wondering if you could tell me about those ruined buildings over there?"

Kazuma blinked when the lost boy pointed over to the abandoned buildings.

"Something about this place has seemed strange to me…"

"Yeah, I've been wondering about those too." Ranma said. "What happened? They look like they've been that way for a long time. Was this place attacked in the war or something?"

"Eh?" Kazuma blinked. "What, don't you guys know? Those places…"

And then he had an epiphany.

"You guys _really_ don't know anything about the Lost Ground, huh?" He chuckled. '_Man, city kids at their worst. If they're this dumb, then I'm __**glad**__ I was born here.'_ He scoffed. "I'll explain it on the way back. Come on, let's go." He turned back towards the clinic and started walking. Kanami fell into step beside him, and the two teens kept just behind him. "Okay, the best place to start is twenty two years ago…"

"Twenty two years?" Ranma asked with a raised eyebrow. '_I think I'd have heard of something like this if it were just twenty years ago…'_

"Yeah," Kazuma nodded. "Originally, this place used to be called Kanagawa prefecture. But there was a huge earthquake, biggest one ever, I think. It was the first, anyway." He pointed into the horizon, and from where they were, Ranma and Ryouga could see the huge spiked rocks in the distance, the ones that Ranma had originally labeled mountains. "That happened during the earthquake."

"Eh? Kanagawa prefecture?" Ranma and Ryouga shared a surprised look.

"Wait, so this is Kanagawa prefecture?" The red head asked.

"That can't be, Kanagawa is all city." Ryouga muttered.

"What?" Kazuma asked as he looked at them. "Listen, Kanagawa has been like this," He said gesturing the open area around them, "For more than twenty years now. There's a city, and a developing area, but this is it for the most part."

Ranma gave him a dubious look.

"But that's—"

"Let him _finish_," Ryouga interrupted.

Ranma looked like she wanted to say something else, but frowned and stopped. The lost boy nodded at Kazuma.

"Go on."

Kazuma shrugged and faced forward again.

"…Well that's it pretty much."

"Twenty two years, you say…" Ryouga shared a frown with Ranma. '_Why haven't we heard of any of this?'_

'_There's no way this is Kanagawa…' _Ranma thought as she looked around.

"Anyway, a lotta people used to live here, but they all left because of the earthquake. Some people had nowhere to go. That's it, really."

"You forgot the Alter Users, Kazu-kun," the girl said from her place beside the boy.

Ranma looked up.

"That's right, that old guy said something about alter users. What the heck are those, anyway?" She prodded.

"Alter Users…" Kazuma trailed off. "Heh. What's an alter user?" He grinned, although from behind him, neither teen could see it. "An alter user is someone born with a special ability. I donno how it works, and I don't care. It's random, though. They started appearing after the earthquake, so everyone thinks that it might have something to do with it."

"Special abilities?" Ryouga asked. "What kind of special abilities?"

"Well…" Kazuma tilted his head. "It depends on the person. I've seen some that are really weird. And then there have been a few cool ones two. But the coolest one I've seen so far belongs to the strongest guy in the world. Heh."

"Strongest guy in the world?" Ranma snorted. "I _know_ the strongest guy in the world, and he ain't no alter user." She said with a smirk.

"Eh?" Kazuma asked as he looked at her. "But non-alter users just can't compare to alter users. There's just too big a difference in power."

"Heh, I've heard all that before," Ranma said, waving it off. "Besides, what did that old guy say, anyway? That they terrorize people? If that's what Alters do, then they're just a bunch of bullies. Maybe they need someone to put them in their place."

"Not all Alter Users are like that," Kanami said quietly.

Everyone looked at her.

"What, do you know an Alter User, Kanami-chan?" Ranma asked.

"…" The girl was quiet for a moment, before answering with a hesitant, "…No."

"Well, I happen to know a couple," Kazuma said off handedly as he looked ahead again. Kanami looked up at him with surprise.

"Kazu-kun knows alter users?" she asked, confused.

"Well, I've dealt with them before… My line of work is kinda rough…"

Kanami accepted that and faced forward again.

"_Kinda rough_… What kind of work do you do, Kazuma-san?" Ryouga asked.

"Kazuma is fine," The brunette responded. "Anyway…uh, Kimishima gives me all sorts of odd jobs."

"So you work for him?" Ranko asked.

Ryouga frowned as he remembered the green haired man from the day before, who'd commented on cooking pork or something.

"Well he's more like a middle man. You could say we're…" He glanced down at the girl by his side. "…freelancers."

"More like freeloaders," the girl from his side said cheerfully.

Kazuma sighed dramatically.

"Yeah, well…we're here!" He said dramatically as he pointed up at the clinic.

Ranma and Ryouga looked at him in surprise, as they hadn't noticed. Kazuma opened the door and walked into the clinic with Kanami behind him. Ranma and Ryouga shared a look before going in after them.

"Yo, Kimishima, did you meet this guy yet?" Kazuma asked. He was standing inside the foyer, and both Nabiki and Kimishima were each sitting on one of two benches across from each other, looking at him. Kimishima glanced at the boy wearing all black and nodded to him.

"You must be Ryouga. Tendouu-san has told me about you." He said with a smile.

"Err, how much has _Tendouu-san_ told you about me?" The lost boy asked nervously.

"Nothing dangerous," Nabiki said lazily. "I'm leaving that to you two for once."

"W-what? You didn't tell him about our… water allergies?" Ranma asked.

"Repeat performances are 3000 yen, you know that Saotome," the older girl drawled. "Anyway, I do have something to talk to you guys about." She stood up and nodded towards Kimishima. "Thanks for the interesting discussion." She looked back at Ranma. "I'll be waiting in the bedroom," She said as she started walking towards the stairs.

"Right…" Kazuma shook his head. "Anyway, Kanami, it's almost three. You wanna go back outside or somethin'?"

She looked up at him and nodded with a smile on her face.

"'Kay, let's go…" He turned around and walked between both Ranma and Ryouga, who were standing on either side of the door and Kanami ran after him.

"Tendouu-san said she had something to tell you guys, right?" Kimishima said as he stood up. "You don't want to keep her waiting too long."

"How would you know about that?" Ranma asked heatedly.

Kimishima laughed at that.

"Ah, don't worry about that, Ranma-kun." He walked over to the door. "I suppose this means I'll see you two tomorrow, then. Take care, all right?"

"Yeah, sure…" Ranma said distractedly.

"You too." Ryouga said with a polite nod. Kimishima chuckled and walked outside.

"Hey! Kazuma! Kanami-chan! I'm going home!" He shut the door behind himself at that point.

"Well, let's go see Nabiki," Ryouga said with a sigh. "I'm sure it's important. Probably related to our getting home."

"Yeah, you're right." The redhead said with a nod as she took him by the arm and started leading him away. "I've got to tell them about the whole curse thing soon though, if we're gonna be here for a while…" She finished just as they reached the top of the stairs.

After walking to the end of the hall where they'd spent the night, they found Nabiki waiting for them on the bed, with her arms crossed, and one leg crossed over the other.

"You came," She said calmly.

"Well yeah," Ranma responded with a frown. "What were you expecting? A no show?"

"Hmm." The Tendou girl shrugged with her usual dangerous smile and Ranma flinched.

She'd knew she'd be paying for that in spades later.

"Anyway, I had an interesting conversation with Kimishima-san," Nabiki said. "Do you two know what alter users are?"

"We heard about them from Kazuma," Ranma supplied. "They're supposed to be really strong. Is that what you talked about?"

"Partially." The girl nodded. She gestured over to the corner, and when both boys turned their heads, they saw the two chairs that had been there the night before. In each chair was a book with a spiral binder. As the two teens walked over to get their chairs, they noticed that the books were maps. They pulled the chairs closer to the bed and then each sat down, picking up a map. "According to Kimishima-san, Alter Users have been around for over twenty years. Not only that, but they started appearing after the great upheaval that earned this place's name, the Lost Ground."

Ranma and Ryouga both nodded at that.

"Kazuma-san told us that too," Ryouga said. "We were also told that Alter Users have been tearing up the countryside, and they… well, most of them, anyway, abuse their power. Kanami told us there were some who didn't but she couldn't say anything else," the boy shrugged.

"That's part of what I heard as well. Did he tell you about the major factions of Alter Users?" She asked.

"Well, no, he didn't say anything about factions," Ryouga said. "Does this go deeper than a bunch of people who started appearing in this area years ago?"

"Much." The girl nodded. Her tone and posture were very serious, and both Ranma and Ryouga braced themselves for whatever the girl would be telling them. "I have been putting things together, and it's a little sketchy, but I've been able to formulate a hypothesis."

"That being…" Ryouga prompted.

"That being, that we are in the future." She said simply.

Both of the younger teens stared at her, one in confusion, and the other with comprehension written all over his face.

"That would explain why Kazuma said this was Kanagawa Prefecture," the lost boy said as he looked down at the map in his hands and looked for the year. "So, does that mean this is 2009? The earthquakes happened when we were sent away, then?"

"Later than that," The girl said. "I didn't ask Kimishima what year it was, because I didn't want to sound crazy. But I did ask about the maps. _What's up with the year?_ He commented offhand about how _old_ they were."

"Wait, wait," Ranma said as she looked down at her map. "The future? How the hell did _that_ happen?"

"When Gosunkugi did whatever he did to us, of course," Nabiki said. "It sent us, at the _very _least, forty years into the future."

"Why forty years?" Ryouga asked.

"Those maps. They were made in 2008. It says so in all of the appropriate places," She said. "It's still all city in there."

Ryouga opened the book and started looking around. He nodded several times and started going through the pages.

"This place hadn't been inhabited by anyone before Kazuma and Kanami showed up, from what Kimishima knows. It was abandoned when the floods and upheaval occurred."

"_Floods?_" Ranma asked.

"Kazuma didn't tell you about the floods?" Nabiki asked as she looked at them both.

They both shook their heads in the negative.

"Apparently, a year after the _Great Upheaval_, there were a set of _Hyper Hurricanes_, which devastated the entire world, killing over sixty percent of the human population." She gave pause as both Ranma and Ryouga's faces went pale at the casual mention of how many people had died. After Nabiki decided they'd had enough time to digest that information, she spoke again. "The only real civilized parts are ruled by different city states, with tons of general poverty just lying around outside of them."

"City states?" Ryouga asked with a look of surprise. "There are no major countries left?"

"There are. Japan is one of them, but most of the Northern Hemisphere is a ruin." The girl said. "North America, Northern Europe, and Russia have been practically destroyed. Unfortunately, Japan's cities are all walled up. You need identification to get out, and identification to get in. Many people starve outside of those walls, although there are a few who live like Kazuma and Kanami do, just barely getting by."

"I see…" Ryouga muttered.

"_I see_… my ass!" Ranma snorted. "How can you two just accept this obvious bullshit? It's gotta be a trick, or some magic."

"_Some magic_," Ryouga snorted. "Saotome, if it was possible for us to be teleported somewhere else, wouldn't it possible for someone to teleport us some_when_ else?"

"W-well…" Ranma frowned. "But, what's with all this crap about the end of the world?"

"No one said the world was ending." Nabiki said with a shake of her head. "If anything, technology has made leaps and bounds forward. And that's just from what I've been able to see here, stuck in storage for twenty years." The girl patted the side of the bed and both of them noticed for the first time, a small plastic box. Nabiki opened it, and while Ranma stared uncomprehendingly, Ryouga saw something there.

"It looks like a computer monitor and keyboard," He said. "But what use are those two together by themselves?"

"You're about to see," Nabiki said as she reached up and pressed a round button.

The two watched as the screen lit up. After a few moments, some unfamiliar logos showed up, although most of them were made up of English words.

"What's Windows Seven?" The lost boy asked.

"Apparently, the name of the operating system," Nabiki said. "The user interface is completely different from what we're used to." In under three minutes, the thing's screen had stopped showing signs of movement, and Nabiki took control of it. She touched a small flat indent that was under the keyboard and moved a small cursor across the screen until it stopped above an icon. Then she tapped the little indent twice, and the screen reacted. "You can access data without inputting long command strings," she commented off handedly.

"Well, this is very different from what they had at school," Ranma muttered.

"That's right, it is." She moved the cursor until it hovered over an icon and tapped the thing twice again. In less than five seconds, an image appeared on the screen. "This is a digital photograph," she said. "It's an aerial view of Kanagawa as it was after the upheaval, but before the hurricanes."

"Hey, there's water everywhere," Ranma said with a frown. "It's an island."

"Which means we can't reach Nerima from here," Nabiki said with a nod.

"Well that sucks. We have to catch a boat or something?"

"An airplane would be nicer," Nabiki remarked as she closed the laptop. "But that's the thing. It all costs money," She said with a frown. "And we have none."

"What? What about what you said earlier?" Ranma demanded.

"All gone," Ryouga said with a shake of his head. "There's no way to get any money. Any banks that would have had her money on file are probably long gone."

"And the bastards probably took possession what I had anyway, unless Kasumi did what I told her to if I ever disappeared for longer than a year."

"Wait a second… That's right…" Ranma said suddenly with a pale face. "If we've been gone for forty _years_… then how has everyone _else_ held up?" She asked quietly.

"Who knows? They might be dead from the hurricanes, getting by like these people, or thriving in a city." Nabiki shrugged.

"Well, I know nothing's changed for the Amazons," Ryouga said.

"Cologne's probably long dead, though," Nabiki said. "She was already an old woman. I'll be surprised if I see her again."

"I won't," Ranma snorted. "The little freak, either. They're both worse than cockroaches."

"Right, well…" Nabiki sighed. "That's our situation."

"Well…" Ranma continued. "Well, what's our plan? What can we do? We're stranded in the future, away from anything resembling family and friends…"

"That happens to me all the time, so I'm not too concerned," Ryouga said. "Well, maybe the future bit is new…"

"Plan, huh…" Nabiki sat there with her eyes narrowed. "I plan on getting into one of those cities, one way or another. What I do from there is none of your business."

"W-what?" Ranma asked. "You mean stay here? In the _future?_"

"Well, unless we can find Gosunkugi, and somehow get him to agree to sending us to the past, I don't think we'll be able to get back." Nabiki said.

"There's got to be a way!" Ranma said angrily. "We can't just accept defeat like that!"

"Its not accepting defeat," Nabiki said as she looked at Ranma with a piercing stare. "Saotome, you did hear what I said about the _hurricanes?_ Starving people, growths in technology, civil unrest? Well then, do you think, that I want to go back forty years, and then live through all of that trouble, when I can stay here… and not?"

Ranma sat back as she considered that.

"This has the potential to be one of the luckiest things that's ever happened to us," Nabiki continued. "Just think. We'll have access to medicine… _technology_," she muttered, looking over the computer. "Entertainment, foods, music, all sorts of things that we might have died without ever _seeing_."

Ryouga frowned.

"It doesn't seem like it'd be easy getting into one of those cities, and even if you did, what would you do from there?" Ryouga asked.

"Like I said, none of your business," the girl said coldly. "You two can go off looking for some way back to the past. I'm going to stay here. This is the opportunity of a lifetime, and I'm a _well-known_ opportunist. There simply is no other choice." She was met with silence from Ranma and Ryouga. "Well then, what do _you_ two intend to do? This does, to be honest, end a lot of your obligations, Saotome. Your engagements cannot be valid anymore, not after you've been gone for forty years. They probably think we're dead."

"Engagements…" Ranma said. "That's right, Akane…"

"Akane was sixteen. She probably got over you and married someone else. I'm sure she doesn't regret it either. As far as anyone is concerned, we're long dead. Not to mention, she's at the very least fifty-six now, to boot."

"That… can't be…" Ranma worked her jaw several times, but was unable to say anything as a distant look clouded her eyes.

"Ranma…" Ryouga started, but he stopped and looked at Nabiki. "I'll look for a way back." He said determinedly.

"Good luck with that," Nabiki snorted.

The lost boy frowned.

"How do you plan on gathering enough money to get into a city?"

"I talked that over with Kimishima." she said. "Don't be surprised if I'm not here in the morning. He promised to introduce me to some people."

"I see." The boy nodded. "Well, you have my assistance in whatever you do. I'm certain what we need won't be on this island."

"Of course." The girl turned to look at Ranma, but the other girl was only staring straight ahead with unfocused eyes. "Let's give Saotome some time to himself." She said as she stood up and started for the door. Ryouga glanced at the girl and nodded, before standing up and following her out of the room.

The room remained silent for several long minutes before Ranma stood up and followed them out with a frown on his face.

-_**Gray Skies Part 2: End**_-


	3. Alter

_-Nerima, Tokyo. Thursday, November 2nd, 1989-_

Suddenly, lances of pure light pierced the floating book and Gosunkugi screamed out in pain.

"What?" The demonic figure shouted as he looked down at himself.

"Now, children!"

Both Kuno and Akane turned to the voice and saw Cologne on a nearby roof, with her hands folded together in a complex manner, as she glowed with white energy. In the place of her usual cane was an elaborately decorated staff with large rings and other ornaments.

"I cannot hold such power for long!"

Akane closed her eyes, as the green aura surrounding her grew heavier.

'_Ranma and Onee-chan are gone… forever. And I don't know if I can even avenge them.' _Tears began to gather at her eyes, and when she opened them again, one spilled out onto her cheek.

"As you say," Kuno said as he held his weapon high above his head with one hand. "_Tenkou Seizan_!" He shouted as he swung it at the beast, sending an intense wave of holy light at the book. The wave of light collided with the book in a grand display, red bolts arcing off of the book as the light engulfed it.

"_Gough!_" Gosunkugi cried out as bolts of light swirled around him, and the red tether began to flicker.

"No… It's not enough!" Cologne shouted. "Do it again!"

Kuno only panted, clutching his chest as he leaned on his blade.

"I… am spent," He said, before falling to his knees. "Urgh…"

"Girl! It's up to you!" Cologne cried out.

Akane looked up at her.

"But what?" She asked.

"Something! _Anything!" _Cologne snapped said. "For once, make yourself useful! We're running out of time!"

Akane stared up at her for a long moment, before an idea occurred. She grit her teeth and sniffed.

'_I'm probably going to get this all wrong… I've only ever seen Ranma-kun and Ryouga-kun do it. I'm not as good as they are… Maybe I shouldn't even be trying…'_

And then she screamed and held up both of her hands.

"_Shishi Hokodan!"_

The roiling cloud of heavy ki around her fizzled.

'_It's not working!'_ She thought. '_It's not working! My sister… and the man I love are dead… and I can't even avenge them!'_

She fell to her knees and choked out a sob, and her aura spiked.

"Now, girl! _Now!"_

"Why should I bother? It's not even going to work!" Akane snapped.

"_Just do it you fool!"_

Akane clenched her eyes and fists shut, and projected all of her sorrow outwards.

"_Shishi Hokodan!"_

A great sphere of heavy ki rose up from her into the air. It steadily climbed into the sky for a short time, before falling back down, where it swallowed up Gosunkugi and his book in its blinding light.

"_**Guo**__**oooaaaaeeeergghhghgaaagghll!**_"

The sphere detonated then, and both the possessed boy and book exploded into black dust that scattered in the wind.

Seeing the matter over, Cologne sighed heavily and dropped out of her pose.

Akane sighed and fell forward on the ground, and Kuno quickly ran over to her.

"She's only exhausted, boy. She used a high level attack that drained almost all of her energy." The old woman said solemnly as she pogoed over to the two.

"…What of Saotome and those who were with him?"

"I assume you mean the other Tendo girl and Hibiki Ryouga," The old woman said as she closed her eyes. "Unfortunately, I cannot feel their Ki."

"But all living things generate Ki," Kuno insisted. "It would not be like Saotome to die in such a way."

"How right," the old woman said with a smile. "It is possible that they have merely been displaced. I do not have the means to search for them over long distances with me in this city, however."

"I see," Kuno said. "Then it is possible that they are still alive, somewhere."

"Heh…" Akane's voice came from below them. "It's a good thing… you didn't tell me that before… I wouldn't have been able to get that off…"

"Hmm, indeed," Cologne shook her head. "For now, it is late, and we must rest. I will see about locating Son-in-law on the morrow."

-スクライド-

Disclaimer: None of the series, characters, or locations mentioned in this story are owned by the author of this story unless stated otherwise.  
Notes:

(1) _Tenkou Seizan_:「天光聖斬/てんこうせいざん」Lit. "Heaven Light Saint Cut". I'm not sure if "Tenkou Seizan" is how it would be read by a Japanese person (There's multiple readings for Kanji) but that one looks correct to me.

GRAY SKIES

-Chapter 3: Alter-

-スクライド-

A week and a half passed, and Ranma's group had settled into a routine. Ranma and Ryouga would wake up to find Nabiki gone, eat breakfast with Kanami, and then go to the farm with the little girl to help out there for small amounts of money and food. Nabiki had not yet bothered to invite either one of them on the morning outings, and had already started saving up money from whatever she did with Kimishima and Kazuma. The young woman wouldn't talk, and had flat out told them she wouldn't until she needed them.

But that day came quickly enough.

-スクライド-

"You're coming with me tomorrow."

Ranma and Ryouga looked up at her from futons on the ground. Nabiki, meanwhile, was sitting on the same bed she'd slept in on that first night. The other rooms had no space to sleep in, or already had an occupant.

"We won't be coming back for three days, actually."

Ranma blinked.

"What, you mean Kanami-chan is coming too?"

"The little girl is staying here," She said.

"All by herself?" Ranma demanded. He was in his male form, and had already explained his and Ryouga's awkward transformations to the house's two inhabitants, as well as Kimishima. It hadn't taken too long to convince the three that they weren't really alter users in disguise, but the one who'd pointed out that it was impossible and done most of the explaining had been Kimishima.

-スクライド-

"I've never seen any water based Alters," Kimishima said. "And I've never seen Alter Users whose Alters were uncontrollable to such a degree. Not only that, but since they both have the same trigger, and they transform, it's just too unlikely because there are no two identical Alters, or even two distinct ones that are that closely related… I think."

The six of them were gathered in the clinic's lobby, or what was now more appropriately called a foyer. Kimishima was sitting on one of the benches with Kanami by his side, while Kazuma leaned against the front door. Nabiki was sitting on the other bench, while Ryouga and a drenched Ranma-chan stood before them all.

"So they're not alter users?" Kazuma asked with confusion scrawled all over his face.

"Alter Users have that glow, don't they?" Kanami reminded him. "They have an aura when they use their powers…"

"You mean that rainbow thing?" Kazuma asked. "That's right… Hey Kanami, how'd you know about that?"

The girl blinked and looked put-off for a moment before answering.

"Kazu-kun told me, remember?" She said. "You're so forgetful, Kazu-kun."

Nabiki's eyebrow merely rose as she watched the exchange.

-スクライド-

"Hey, Nabiki, you okay?"

"Yeah, I just spaced out," the girl said. "Anyway, as I was saying, Kanami can take care of herself, and there's the farm to consider. I'm sure they'll put her up for three days."

"Yeah, they probably will," Ranma said with a sigh. "What do we tell them, though?"

"We're going out on a business trip, that's all," Nabiki said. "Nothing more. Now turn out the lights, we need to get sleep since we're leaving early." She lay sideways just as Ranma stood up and walked over to the door, where the light switch was, and closed her eyes as he flicked the switch, leaving the room in complete darkness. After a moment, a stray thought drifted through her mind. '_That girl is hiding what she can do__…_'

-スクライド-

Morning came swiftly for Ranma. He'd been unable to sleep well since finding out they were in the future (which he still stubbornly harbored some doubt to), and had taken to doing kata when he couldn't sleep, or woke up too soon. The boy sighed as he looked into the cardboard box and took out what was now his now trademark red and black ensemble. Ryouga had taken to what the gender bending martial artist had found him, but Nabiki had bought some new clothes that more resembled what she'd used to wear; skimpy shorts and some semi-revealing shirts.

Ranma pulled his clothes on and took his hair tie from atop a drawer, tying his hair into the familiar braid as he walked out of the room. As he passed by Kazuma and Kanami's room, he glanced in at the two inhabitants. Both were sleep, and as he looked at them, he noticed a strange, multi-colored glow around the young child, and blinked.

'_That's supposed to mean __something__… Ah well.'_ Shrugging it off as unimportant, he continued along the hall and down the stairs to the foyer, where he grabbed his slippers and put them on. Then he opened the door and walked outside, shutting it behind himself quietly. The sun had not yet risen, and the sky was still intensely dark. There were no working clocks in the clinic, and the one on that little computer Nabiki had started keeping with her couldn't have been set on the right time. As he looked up at the slowly brightening sky, he mentally set the time to be somewhere around five or so.

With that, Ranma closed his eyes and cleared his mind as he prepared to start.

"What are you doing, Ranma-chan?" came a soft, tired voice from the side.

Ranma opened his eyes and looked over to the door. Just in front of it, on the steps, sat Kanami.

"Haven't I told you not to call me that? Why do you still do it even when I'm a guy, anyway?" He said in an empty, humorless voice.

She didn't seem to notice, as tired as she was, and giggled.

"Why are you up, anyway? Couldn't you sleep okay?" He asked.

She nodded.

"Yes, I was able to sleep…" She said. She looked up at the slowly fading stars. "…I was dreaming… It was a very intense, rough, and brave dream…"

"…" Ranma turned away and stared off into the distance. "…Sounds like some dream."

"Does Ranma-chan dream too?" After a pause, Ranma shook his head slowly.

"…I used to. Not any more." He said, cracking a half a smile. "My dreams used to be intense, rough, and brave, too."

"That's too bad. I hope Ranma-chan starts dreaming again soon."

"…Thanks."

After that, neither said anything for a whole minute, and Ranma remembered the whole reason for coming outside and closed his eyes, once again clearing his mind in preparation for a simple kata. Once he began, Kanami took notice and looked down from the sky to watch.

-スクライド-

"So you're going to be away for three days."

The heavyset woman peered at Kazuma, Ranma, and Ryouga. Kimishima and Nabiki were waiting down by the road in the jeep while they explained their case to the farm's owners. The woman glared at Kazuma, but seemed to have an approving look when she inspected the other two teens.

"If he had come alone, I'd be setting up a permanent bedroom," The woman said, casually flicking her thumb at Kazuma. The boy sighed at that and hung his head. "But I know you two will come back for her. You'd better, anyway."

"Thank you," Ryouga said with a slight bow. "It is most appreciated."

Ranma, who was in her female form, since she hadn't bothered to explain anything to the people at the farm, knelt down and started ruffling the girl's hair.

"You behave now, okay Kanami-chan?" She said.

Kanami only giggled.

"Okay, onee-chan." She said with an overdose of sweetness.

Ranma frowned as both Kazuma and Ryouga immediately busted a gut. The older woman merely smiled, not having seen most of the humor in the exchange.

"Ugh… gimme a break." Ranma pouted and stood back up.

"You three go on then, don't you have somewhere to be?" the older woman asked, still smiling at the exchange.

"Yeah, that's right. Thanks a lot, really," Kazuma said as he calmed down. "So then, see ya later, Kanami." The boy said as he turned around and waved.

"Thank you again, you've really saved us," Ryouga said, bowing once more before both he and Ranma both turned to leave.

Halfway back to the car, they turned around and waved, and both Kanami and the woman waved back. Once they were there, Kimishima, who'd been leaning against the car door, looked at them.

"How'd it go?"

"It was alright, they didn't have any problems," Ranma said as she climbed into the back of the car and picked up a thermos. Ryouga and Kazuma sat on either side of her as she opened it and emptied its contents over herself. Kimishima got into the driver's seat and Nabiki turned around to look at them from the passenger seat, raising a pair of sunglasses as she did so.

"Well then, you're all ready?"

"Yeah," Ranma said as he toweled himself off.

"Then, Kazuma, I believe you know what to tell them," the girl said, turning back around.

"Right," Kazuma nodded. He turned his head to look at both of the other teens. "Well, first off, what do you two know about our jobs?"

"You said you were into freelancing," Ryouga said. "Is that not the case?"

"Er, well, it is, but a more accurate term would be to call us mercenaries," Kazuma said as he crossed his arms. "We do jobs for important people, and it gets us paid well."

"What _kind_ of important people?" Ranma demanded with narrowed eyes.

"You know, _important_ people," Kazuma said with a grin. "Anyway, we don't do anything bad, unless they're willing to pay a lot. Usually the worst I get to do is rough someone else's thugs up," he said with a shrug. "But there's also the fact that some of these other people have alter users at their disposal. That's when I get to have fun, you see," He said.

"Have fun?" Ranma asked. "You mean you fight Alter Users?"

"That's right," Kazuma nodded.

"How do you do that? I thought you said Alter Users were incredibly powerful?" Ryouga asked with his brow creased.

"Kazuma _is_ an Alter User," Kimishima explained. "He's the strongest one I've ever seen, too."

"I see," Ryouga nodded. "I expected as much."

Ranma looked interested.

"Alter User... what do you do, anyway?" The pig-tailed martial artist asked.

"You'll get to see that later," Nabiki said. "For now, Kazuma, explain what we're doing this time."

"Right," Kazuma said with another nod. "Well, two days ago, a high ranking executive from the city was abducted while he was wandering around outside the city walls. I can't figure out exactly what the idiot was doing outside his prissy walled up play-pen, but we're going to rescue him."

"Rescue? Isn't that kind of different from your usual work?" Ryouga asked.

"Who cares? It pays well." Kazuma said with a shrug.

"What about us?" Ranma asked.

"You two are getting paid, too. As for Kimishima-san and I, we're getting something that goes deeper than money out of this," Nabiki said as she started inspecting her nails.

"A high ranking official, huh... So, you're thinking if _we_ save him, you can keep him in your pocket and start making friends in high places?" Ryouga asked.

"Sharp one, aren't you." Nabiki said cheerfully.

"Why did it take so long for you guys to invite us to this kind of work, anyway?" Ranma asked.

"Kimishima-san has been watching you guys since we arrived. He had to make sure you two could handle our kind of work," Nabiki said offhandedly.

"Yes, that's right," the driver said cheerfully. He glanced out the corner of his eyes at the girl to his side. He'd been watching her too, but there was no reason to tell her that.

Likewise, the Tendo girl smiled to herself as she noticed the slight twitch of his eyes from her peripheral vision. She'd noticed that he'd been watching her too, but there was no need to let him know that.

"Today, we're going to meet with some contacts of ours to get more information." Kimishima continued.

"Contacts..." Ranma frowned. "What exactly do _you_ two do? If we're going to be rescuing this guy, obviously the three of us are gonna be doing the hard labor."

"Middle management," Ryouga answered for them. "It's simple. They do all the talking, we do all the hitting."

"Oh," Ranma said. "Well, why is it supposed to take three days? How many people do we have to _hit?_"

Kimishima chuckled.

"First off, we have to find out where these guys are. Then, from there, we need to gather intelligence on the area, their man power, etc. Someone from inside the city gave us what little information we already have, we're going to have to meet with them again to get any real work done. We're going to be near the city for a while."

"The city, huh... Can you tell us anything else about Alter Users in general?" Ryouga asked.

"Alter Users..." Kazuma started that time. "Hmm, well there's not much to say about us..."

"There's a group of alter users who call themselves HOLY, they make up a special division of the police force for the city," Kimishima started.

"Special division?"

"Police force?"

"The usual police force is composed of normal humans with guns and the like, but HOLY was made specifically to combat Alter Users like Kazuma there," Kimishima said. "Thing is, although they claim to be rooting out Alter Criminals, they'll force any Native Alter Users they find to either join them or be imprisoned."

"They'll arrest anyone who's minding their own business just because they're an Alter User?" Ryouga asked with a frown.

"That's right," Kimishima confirmed.

"Why do they do that?" Ranma asked.

"We're not sure, but there has been an information leak from the inside that says they're taken to the Main Land, and used for something. Either way, it can't be all that fun."

"That's why, if we run into any HOLY members, we get the hell out." Kazuma started. "I ain't afraid of them or anything, but it would suck if they even knew I existed."

"Because then they'll start to actively hunt for you." Ryouga said with a nod.

"What about Kanami?" Ranma asked. "What would they do to her if they ever caught you?"

"Nothing," Kazuma snorted. "'Cause I'd never tell them where she was."

"Why not?" Ranma asked with a frown.

"She doesn't need any of this garbage," Kazuma said with a sigh. "She's just a kid, and she's not even an Alter User."

"They might even use her to entice Kazuma into joining HOLY if they found her," Nabiki added.

"That too," The boy nodded.

"Huh..." Ranma sat back as the car sped down the dirt road.

The conversation died after that.

-スクライド-

Ranma stared up at the huge wall that served as a barrier between the urban district and the undeveloped district. It was at least ten stories high, and beyond the wall, inside the city, he could see buildings that literally towered over it. As he looked up at the tall, foreboding structures, any doubt that he was actually in the future was quickly expunged. There were several skyscrapers in the city, and because of its lack of developmental space thanks to the huge walls, he could see several roads suspended in the air by huge support beams. But above all else, and quite literally so, there stood a colossal tower in the distance. It had the appearance of great disc-shaped platforms of variable width being stacked atop one another. Several of the suspended roads led straight to it, and Ranma was sure that there were even more ways inside from the ground level.

"What's that huge thing?" Ranma asked. He, Kazuma and Ryouga had been left in the car while Nabiki and Kimishima went to the appointed spot to meet with their associate. Their parking spot had left them in view of the city though, and both Ranma and Ryouga marveled at how… well, _futuristic_ the whole place looked.

"I dunno, I guess that's HOLY or something else important," the native alter shrugged. "I've never been in there before."

"Never?" Ranma asked.

"You have to have ID or something to get in," Kazuma shrugged. "Otherwise we'd all be in there, partying or something, right?"

"Nabiki told us this, Ranma. Remember?" Ryouga said.

"Oh. Well that was a long time ago, I'd forgotten…" the pig-tailed martial artist said. Ryouga looked at the pigtailed-martial artist and frowned.

"Say, Ranma, can we talk for a moment?" The boy asked.

"I guess, not like I'm going anywhere," Ranma shrugged without looking at the other teen.

"I meant in private," Ryouga said calmly.

"Oh, um, sure, I guess." Ryouga turned and started walking in a random direction and Ranma followed after him. Once they were without of hearing distance of Kazuma, who really couldn't care less anyway, he whipped back around and looked at his rival, and without preamble, spoke.

"You've changed."

"Huh?" Ranma blinked. "What do you mean I've changed?"

"I've been noticing recently… you act a little differently. It started when we found out we were in the future. What's going on with you?" the fanged boy demanded.

"It's none of your business," Ranma snorted.

"It's about Akane-san, isn't it?" Ryouga prodded. "When Nabiki suggested she'd married someone else and was happy, you got upset."

"Heck no, it ain't about that tomboy," Ranma snorted.

"Then what is it?" Ryouga demanded.

"It's nothing!" Ranma shouted.

"Fine then, don't tell me. After all, how can I help you if I don't know what the problem is?" Ryouga said sarcastically. "Whatever, Saotome. Let's just go back."

"I don't need your help," Ranma snorted as he started walking back to the jeep. Ryouga narrowed his eyes and followed him back.

"What happened to you guys?" Kazuma asked when they both returned. "You have an argument?"

"Nothing, don't worry about it." Ranma said, forcing himself to calm down. Ryouga glanced at the other boy with a frown on his face.

'_Prideful fool…_' He shook his head in silent thought.

-スクライド-

That night, Ranma was sitting outside a modest single story house on a brick fence, looking up at the stars.

"Yo," a voice came from behind him and he turned around to see Kazuma standing there. "What are you doing up so late?"

"Just thinking about someone," Ranma said honestly. "What's up?"

"I woke up and found that you were missing," Kazuma said with a shrug.

"Well, I'm not Ryouga, so you don't need to worry about it."

"Hm, actually I was thinking of something else." Kazuma said with a grin.

"Huh?"

"You say you're as strong as an Alter User, but I don't think so," Kazuma snorted. "Just another tough guy who doesn't know what's going on, that's what you are."

"Oh really?" Ranma asked in a distorted voice. He chuckled. "You want to try me?"

"Maybe."

"Hmm," Ranma hopped down from the fence and landed on his feet. "I never refuse challenges, you know."

"That's convenient, but I wouldn't call this a challenge. More of a test," The alter user said with grin.

"I hate tests."

"Heh, that's good too," Kazuma said as he held up his right arm.

A multi-colored aura surrounded him, and before Ranma's very eyes, large chunks of the fence he had been sitting on suddenly dematerialized into a floating mass of glowing dust. Kazuma's right arm split into three even sections down the middle and the dust like material flew over to his arm as golden bands appeared all along his arm, binding the three sections together. The matter all converged on his arm and began to cover it in shiny yellow and orange metal. When the transformation was done, his arm had bulked up considerably, and looked to be made completely of metal. There were three red fins hovering behind his right shoulder.

"So that's an Alter?" Ranma snorted. "Doesn't look tough." Kazuma grinned and immediately went into action. He punched the ground with his right hand and flew into the air. Ranma looked up and whistled. "Well I guess it has to be pretty strong if you prefer jumping with your hand." Ranma jumped back just as Kazuma's fist crashed into the ground where he'd been standing. Kazuma looked up and Ranma blinked as he noticed that Kazuma's hair had become more solid. It was spiked up and rough looking, unlike before when his hair had simply fallen around his face.

"My alter doesn't look like much, but it's the strongest one in the world," Kazuma grinned.

"We'll see about that," Ranma said as he took a martial arts stance.

Kazuma knelt there for a moment, assessing his opponent.

"If you don't go all out, you'll lose," Ranma said as he launched at the other boy.

Kazuma leapt straight up into the air, not bothering to use his fist that time, and Ranma passed under him. He flipped in the air and landed facing Ranma as the martial artist turned around and simply watched. Each carefully watched the other, neither one making any sudden moves, until finally Kazuma leapt at Ranma with his left, unarmored fist cocked back and swung at the martial artist.

Ranma almost laughed as he dodged the attack, and several following ones. Kazuma was clearly untrained and fought every bit like the street fighting brawler he was, but the other teen was quickly picking up his speed, and Ranma had to give him credit for that as he allowed himself to be pushed back. Soon, Ranma found himself blocking blows rather than dodging – most of them from Kazuma's unarmored arm, and decided he could return the favor. Kazuma's eyes widened as Ranma's fist suddenly impacted with his chest, and then followed up with a mild uppercut to his chin.

They both disengaged and Ranma smirked at his opponent.

"I think I can get into this," Kazuma smirked back and soon the fight was rejoined.

Ranma bent backwards to dodge another punch and kicked up, hitting Kazuma's chin in a backflip. He touched down on the ground with both hands and completed the flip, standing up and peering at his opponent. Kazuma leapt at him with his left fist held back, and Ranma moved to block it, but suddenly, the Alter User's right arm shot forward, catching Ranma in the gut and sending him flying.

Ranma's eyes widened at the burst of speed and strength. He flipped in the air and landed on his feet in time to see the brunette running at him. Kazuma leapt at him again and this time Ranma rolled over to the side. Kazuma's momentum carried him forward and his fist crashed into the ground behind the two. Ranma's hand lit up with blue energy and he called out the name of an attack.

"_Mouko Takabisha!_" The boy yelled as he threw a glowing ki sphere at the Alter user.

Kazuma narrowed his eyes at the approaching projectile, and at just the right moment swatted it away with his right arm, sending it veering off course into the night sky. He grinned at Ranma, only to be surprised as an equally pleased looking martial artist flew at him with his fists by his side for an attack. He barely had enough time to bring his transformed arm to bear, and threw a punch that Ranma was surprised to see. Kazuma grinned again as he caught Ranma in the gut again, and the martial artist hung there on his fist for a moment.

"Thought I'd block or something?"

"Sorta," Ranma said, sounding as if he was in pain. "This is okay, too." He suddenly snapped back to life and lifted his entire body onto Kazuma's arms, wrapping them around it and twisting it in an arm bar. Kazuma blinked at the martial artist.

"What the heck is that supposed to do?" He asked, confusedly. The other teen suddenly exerted force on his arm and Kazuma shouted out in pain. "Hey, what the heck!" He swung his right arm around in a panic. "The hell are you doing?"

"Well, it's supposed to hurt," Ranma explained. _'But how the hell are you swinging me around?'_ He added mentally. Eventually, Ranma leapt off to avoid getting dizzy. _'Geez, that arm is retardedly strong.'_ He thought as he landed. Kazuma looked at his arm in shock and then back at the other teen.

"No one's been able to hurt it that much before," Kazuma said with a grin.

"Pfeh, I've heard that before," Ranma snorted in amusement as he took a non-aggressive stance with his hands at his sides. Kazuma bent his knees and crouched with his chest low to the ground, and the pig-tailed martial artist found himself reminded of a predator about to attack.

"If I didn't already know better, I'd call you an Alter User for sure," He said with a grin. Ranma just shrugged.

"Heh. You ain't seen nothin' yet," The martial artist told him.

"Well don't keep me waiting," Kazuma said smoothly as he suddenly punched the ground and flew up into the air above Ranma. "_Shocking First Bullet!_"

Ranma watched as one of the red fins behind him started eroding away, leaving a green energy trail in its wake. Kazuma suddenly shot forward at him at incredible speed, but the surprise only lasted a moment for Ranma. The martial artist jumped back in time for Kazuma's fist to crash into the ground once again. The resulting impact made a small crater in the ground.

"That was a bit faster than before," Ranma acknowledged. "But I can move faster too," He said as he leapt at the alter user.

Kazuma's eyes widened when Ranma rained a wide and incredibly fast spray of punches down on him. The brunette flew back from the force of the blows and skid across the ground several times. Ranma smirked as his opponent righted himself on the ground and stood up.

"You sure you aren't an Alter User?" Kazuma asked with another grin. Although he'd been able to mostly shrug the attack off, a feeling told him that Ranma was still holding back on him.

"You sure you are one?" Ranma asked, matching his smirk.

"That's what they tell me," Kazuma said, shrugging. "I just hit stuff." His grin didn't fade as he held up his right arm in front of his face.

Ranma was able to see the alter user's armored arm change suddenly as he prepared for an attack; Kazuma's triceps suddenly split open, revealing more metal underneath. Two thin metal protrusions shot out from the base of his triceps past his elbow.

"_Annihilating Second Bullet!_" The teen suddenly launched at Ranma as a second red fin disintegrated, leaving green energy in his wake.

Ranma moved to the side and turned his head in time to see Kazuma's fist pass right by his eyes. Kazuma rotated several times from the energy on his right arm, and even after he touched down with his right foot, he spun on it and knelt down, and his left foot drew a curved line in the dirt around him. They both looked at each other appreciatively and prepared to go all out with their next attacks.

"How long are you two idiots going to do this?"

Both Ranma and Kazuma blinked in surprise and looked up to see both Nabiki and Ryouga standing at the door to the house.

"Causing me to lose sleep costs you by the _second_," Nabiki gritted out angrily.

Ranma immediately dropped out of his stance and held up his hands.

"Uh, we're done, we're done." He said hurriedly.

Kazuma blinked at the display.

"You'd better be." the girl said angrily as she walked back inside the house.

Kazuma looked at Ryouga.

"Why didn't you join in? It would have been more fun."

"I was fine just watching," Ryouga said, waving it off casually. "It'll be harder to sleep with all that adrenaline, you know?" He said as he turned around back into the house.

Both Ranma and Kazuma looked at each other with frowns on their faces before uttering a single word in unison.

"_Crap._"

-スクライド-

"Looks like we finally found these bastards," Kazuma said in anticipation as the car stopped before a dark building.

It was the early morning of the fourth day, and there were several lit lampposts around the building with groups of thugs all carrying dangerous looking blunt instruments. Kazuma, Ranma, and Ryouga all quickly hopped out of the car.

"And so close to where we live, too. That pisses me off."

"I got tired of waiting for this," Ranma snorted in agreement. "I can't believe we spent that long just trying to find these assholes."

"They didn't exactly want people coming after them. You think if they were in an obvious spot that the city wouldn't have found them by now?" Kimishima asked, raising an amused eyebrow at their antics.

"I guess," Ranma said with a shrug. "I don't know how these things work, really."

"Right, well, you guys can take it from here, right?" Nabiki asked. "We'll be waiting here for when you get back."

The three teens nodded at that and started walking towards the building, but they stayed out of the light.

"So we just rush in there and kick their asses, save the guy and then go home?" Ranma asked. "There's a lot of guys on the ground, though. Shouldn't be a problem, but if they know we're there then they might take the guy somewhere else while we're fighting and then whoops he's gone."

"They're probably keeping the guy inside," Ryouga said with a frown. "Should we go in from different angles?"

"I've got an idea," Kazuma said. "Why don't we go in from above?"

"Above?" Ranma blinked at that. "What the heck do you mean?"

"We can jump from one building to another, right?" The alter user asked, pointing at another tall dilapidated building.

"Hmm… we can. If we go in from above, they'll be surprised, and we might be able to get to the guy before they move him away." Ryouga said in contemplation. "That's not a bad idea…"

"Then let's go already." Ranma said as he entered the nearest building.

Kazuma and Ryouga quickly followed, and once inside the teens looked around.

"Hey, it's a department store. Or was one, anyway." Ranma commented.

The interior of the first floor was ruined; things were knocked over, walls destroyed and trash spread all around. There was a directory on the wall near the entrance, and Ranma held up a hand, willing a small glowing ball of Chi to appear.

"The stairs are this way," he said, pointing. They all nodded to each other and started for the stairs.

Walking around the debris rather than through it, the group came to the door that led to the stairwell. They walked in and started up the spiral staircase, only to come to a halt at the second floor. The stairs that led to the third floor and higher were destroyed and lie in rubble in front of them. They looked up they could see that the stairs started up again four floors above them.

"I wasn't thinking there'd be something like this," Kazuma said with a frown. "Are there more stairs around?"

"Maybe, but the elevator should be nearby." Ryouga said.

"I don't think the elevator'll work, genius," Ranma snorted.

"I know, that's why we'll climb up the emergency ladder. Or the cables, if need be." Ryouga said casually as he walked out the door.

Ranma blinked as Kazuma followed him and frowned, but joined them. The second floor didn't have nearly the amount of damage as the first floor, and Ranma noticed a mound of clothes covering a sleeping person, but neither of the other teens paid it any heed so he ignored it.

"…I knew that's what you meant," He muttered as he followed after them. "I'm just surprised that you'd come up with something like that. You don't seem the type to know about department stores."

"I didn't say anything," Ryouga responded.

Ranma went silent after that.

It wasn't long before they found the elevator. Ryouga stepped forward and cracked his knuckles before reaching out and grabbing each door. With a grunt, the lost boy quickly forced the elevator doors open. Inside, the shaft was empty save for the cables they'd been expecting. The emergency ladder's rungs were mostly rusted over and bent or broken. Ryouga reached out and tested one by pulling on it slightly. He nodded and then leapt up, grabbing hold of the cables and pulling himself up. Ranma quickly followed, but Kazuma stayed back for moment as the sensation of being watched suddenly washed over him. By instinct, the teen turned his head, but he only saw a large pile of clothes lying on the ground. He raised a brow in confusion and started looking around.

"Kazuma! What's keeping you?" Ranma's voice echoed down the narrow shaft.

"Oh, I just thought I saw something," Kazuma said as he turned back to the shaft and leapt up to grab the metal cables. The three teens climbed up, and soon, they came to the roof, which was set above the twelfth floor. Ryouga stared at the twin doors in thought. Hanging as he was from the cables, he couldn't get the leverage he needed to pry them open. He cocked a fist back and punched the two doors, smashing them outwards, then leapt from the cables to the ledge and continued onto the roof. Ranma and Kazuma quickly came out behind him and started looking around.

"What's with all of these exotic flowers?" The brunette asked. Although the outside of most abandoned buildings were covered in moss and vines, the roof had plants that Kazuma hadn't seen before.

"It's a roof garden," Ryouga noted. "They imported stuff from all over the world, and it survived up here without anyone to care for it." He walked over to the edge and put his food on the raised ledge. "How convenient. They're keeping him on the top floor."

Kazuma and Ranma walked over to the edge and peered over. The other building could be seen across from them, easily distinguishable from the rest because of how well lit the roof was. There were a group of thugs all standing around, some playing card games, or telling jokes and just laughing around. In the center of the group was a red girder with a heavyset man in a suit and tie tied up with ropes. They couldn't see any more details at their distance, but that was more than enough to tell them they had chosen right in coming in from above.

"How are we going to get over there? It's a little further than we thought." Ranma pointed out.

"Yeah…" Ryouga frowned and Kazuma turned around to look around. As the alter user looked up into the sky, he smiled.

"Here comes our chance," the alter user said cheerfully. Both Ranma and Ryouga turned around to look at what he was talking about and blinked.

"An airplane?" Ryouga asked.

"It is flyin' kinda low," Ranma remarked. "So we jump when it gets over here?"

Kazuma nodded and held up his right arm as he was enveloped in a multicolored glow. Chunks of the concrete vanished and the floating dust reformed into the metal encasing over his right arm. Ranma and Ryouga knelt down as the plane got ever closer. Once it was close enough, all three jumped in unison – Ranma and Ryouga using their legs, while Kazuma punched the ground with his metal covered fist. The three all quickly launched into the air and landed on the plane's left wing. Without missing a beat, Kazuma punched the wing and all three teens leapt up higher. As they fell towards the building, Kazuma smirked and aimed his fist downwards, Ranma held up his hands and Ryouga reached up to his forehead.

"_Mouko Takabisha!_" Ranma cried out the name of his attack as a huge sphere of blue chi appeared at his palms and flew down at a group of the men.

Ryouga tossed several of his bandanas down at the men who were by now all looking up in surprise at Ranma's shout. The blue chi ball crashed into several of the men and punched a hole in the ground that continued all the way to the ground floor, and Ryouga's projectiles all hit individual targets.

"_Shocking First Bullet!_" Kazuma cried out as one of the red fins on his back vanished, and he shot forward in a burst of green energy. As his fist came into contact with the roof, the entire building shook, and by the time Ranma and Ryouga had landed, it'd started to collapse under the force of his attack. Ranma shot towards the captive man, took a hold of the steel girder and leapt off the side of the building, followed by both Ryouga and Kazuma. The three landed roughly on the ground as the building continued to fall in on itself and Ranma dropped the heavy man down to the ground rather carelessly.

"A-alter users!" The thugs on the ground all screamed and started running away. Many of the thugs in the rubble were unconscious or in too much pain to realize what had happened.

As the dust cleared, Ranma smirked as he looked at the destruction and carnage that was their handiwork.

"Man, that was too easy, not even one alter user." He said, and then looked down at the man in the suit, who seemed to have fainted. "But this old guy is way too heavy."

"Well, you only have to carry him to the car," Ryouga snorted. "Better get to it." He said as he started walking away. Kazuma smirked as he took his cue and quickly moved to follow, leaving Ranma behind with the overweight salaryman and girder.

"What? You assholes!" Ranma growled as he knelt down and haphazardly grabbed the man by his bindings with one hand. Ranma followed them and caught quickly caught up, despite his cumbersome load. Once they made it to the car, he set the man in the back compartment of the Jeep.

"You guys done already?" Nabiki asked. She was sitting in the car while Kimishima leaned on the door to the driver's seat. "Oh well. I guess it's to be expected from you three," She said with a shrug. "We're not that far from the clinic, so Kimishima and I are gonna take this guy back while you guys walk home. Alright?"

"Yeah, I know this area," Kazuma said with a nod as he looked around. "We'll probably be back in half an hour or so." The sun peaked over the mountains in the distance and the sky was already a bright blue. Kimishima opened the car door and sat down, almost immediately starting the engine.

"We'll be back later today," he told them. "You can go see Chikawa about getting paid. He should know about our success by the time you get there."

Kazuma nodded.

"Got it."

"All right, see ya later," the driver said as he took off.

"Well, that's that," Kazuma sighed. "I can't believe we left Kanami for three days for this."

"Me neither," Ranma agreed. "It better pay well."

Ryouga just snorted.

-スクライド-

As the trio stepped out of a rundown looking house in a neighborhood of rundown looking houses, Ranma snickered to himself as he counted his money.

"I can't believe we got this _much_," He said in a giddy voice as they continued walking, turning onto the street when the weeded dirt path that led from the home ended.

"Hey Kazuma, if you make this much all the time, why are you so poor?" Ryouga asked, looking at the Alter User. Kazuma looked surprised.

"This is a lot?" He asked. "It doesn't look like much." He said as he looked down. In his hands, as well as Ranma and Ryouga's, were at least ten bills, all marked with a one and three zeroes succeeding it in each corner.

"We each got at least ten thousand yen!" Ranma said, shocked at his answer. "What do you mean not much?"

"He doesn't know the value of money," Ryouga said impassively as he pocketed his own share. "He probably gets swindled all the time."

"Hey, I don't get swindled," Kazuma said with a frown. "Kanami-chan does all the shopping."

"Hey, that's the first time you called her Kanami-chan," Ranma noted. "Anyway, that means we need to teach _both_ of you the value of money. The clinic's not too far, right? So you said?"

"Yeah, that's right," Kazuma said. "We could take our time if we wanted, actually. We have to pay a toll to get under a bridge from where we are, but it's not much," Kazuma said.

"Not much…" Ryouga frowned. "I'll believe you when I see the price," he mumbled.

-スクライド-

"Hell no," Ranma said angrily. "Three thousand yen just to cross under this bridge? I'll just jump over the damn thing, thanks,"

The old man standing before them glared at him.

"Jump over it? And just how the hell do you plan on doing that?" He demanded. "Kazuma, you with these idiots?"

"Um…"

"Kazuma, if you've been paying three thousand every time you come through here, this guy has definitely been cheating you," Ryouga said with a frown. "We should just go through it."

"W-what? You have to pay the toll!" The old man growled.

"Who's gonna stop us?" Ranma demanded.

The old man smirked as two men walked out from under the bridge. They were both very muscular and had a menacing look about them. One of them sported tons of scars all over his naked torso and arms, and the other one had a very thin muscle shirt that showed off his impressive physique.

Ranma snorted.

"You're joking right?" He snickered and Ryouga chuckled to himself.

"Hey, idiots," Ryouga said as he stepped up. "Which one of you is stronger?"

They both stepped up at the same time, and then frowned and looked at each other.

"Heh, that's all right. Both of you can attack me at once." He said as he crossed his arms. "Now come on, hit me as hard as you can."

"Uh…"

"You sure that's okay?" The one with the shirt asked, scratching his head.

"Yeah, go ahead. I'll even turn around," Ryouga said as he turned his back on them. "Come on now, we don't have all day."

"Oh man, this is gonna be great," Ranma snorted.

"Boss, what should we do?" the scarred one asked the old man.

The old man snorted.

"Go on and hit the fool, should teach him a lesson." By now, nearby people were all starting to watch the display.

"Come on now, both of you, at the same time," Ryouga said. "I'd like to get this over with."

"Well, if yas say so, chump," The shirtless one said with a grin. They both cocked their fists back, and screamed towards Ryouga with malevolent intent and several of the passersby gasped.

When their fists impacted the lost boy's back, he made no reaction at all. Ryouga started tapping his foot in apparent impatience.

"When are you guys going to hit me already? I left it wide open for you," He said as he turned around to look at them. "Oh, you did already?"

The two men looked at each other in confusion.

"Now that that's over, how about I show you how hard _I_ can hit?" He asked, cracking his knuckles.

"A-alter user!" The old man said suddenly. "That's got to be it! You must be one of them damned alter users!" Several people in the crowd gasped again, while others started mumbling nervously and Ryouga frowned.

"I'm not an Alter User," he said calmly.

"Sure you are! You're _some_ kind of damned monster!" the old man growled out. "And you raise a ruckus by refusing to pay toll!"

"You're demanding far too much money," Ryouga said. "Three hundred would be a more appropriate price than three thousand. And since this is technically public property, you can't really demand a toll anyway. You're not a civil servant and I'm sure this isn't sanctioned by any form of government. Tolls are supposed to be used to fund public services, after all."

"W-what?" the old man cringed.

"You heard me. This bridge and tunnel belongs to everyone, not just you. You didn't build it. Everyone here should be able to use it at their leisure, instead of paying you money just because you said they had to."

"Y-you…" the old man sputtered. "N-now listen here, you little upstart! I'm just an honest man making an honest living! You're the one coming out of nowhere and disrupting everything!"

"It's a martial artists' duty to stop evil when they see it, even if it's petty," Ranma snorted.

"_Evil!_" The man shouted. "You're the one interrupting the peace-"

"Shut up already," Kazuma said suddenly. "I don't really know what's going on, but this is just taking too long and I'm starting to get annoyed. Let's just leave already." He scowled at the old man. "And I trust these guys. I'm not paying you a single coin ever again, you stupid old geezer,"

"How dare you!" the old man thundered. "Reizo! Shigeki! Kick the shit outta these losers!"

"Um, boss…" The scarred man scratched his head. "You did see us hit him, didn't you?"

"That's right! He's an alter user!" The old man remembered. "Get out of here, you monster!"

"I'm not an Alter User," Ryouga snorted as he walked under the bridge with Ranma and Kazuma in tow. "I'm just a martial artist."

"You can't go in there without paying, damn it!" the old man shouted. "Come back here!" The three ignored his calling, however, and he growled at the two men in front of him. "You idiots! You let them get away!"

"Sorry, boss. But dat guy's an alter user. No way we're pickin' a fight with one o' dem," the one with a shirt said, rubbing his head.

"I SAID I WASN'T AN ALTER USER!"

"Right kid," the one with the scars snorted. "Like anyone wit' skin dat hard ain't one o' dem freaks."

-スクライド-

"Well, that's one way to introduce yourself to the local populace…" Ryouga muttered as the three walked along a dirt path that was quickly becoming familiar. '_This discrimination against Alter Users is going to become a problem…'_

"I can't believe that old man's been cheating me this whole time," Kazuma growled.

"You never thought about why you had to pay to go under a bridge?" Ranma asked, incredulously.

"Nah, he was just there, so I thought it was natural." Kazuma explained.

"Hmm…" Ryouga frowned. "The level of education in the Lost Ground seems to be lacking. If anything, we should teach both Kazuma and Kanami the value of money as quickly as possible…" His frown lightened as his thoughts took a more positive turn. "Or rather, that would be best left to Nabiki… Then again, maybe not."

"We're almost to the farm," Kazuma said. "It's pretty early, so Kanami might still be working. We can just wait around at the rocks," Kazuma said.

"You're kidding, right? There's no reason not to help if they're working," Ryouga said.

"Uh, actually…" Ranma started nervously. "We just finished a job already. We don't wanna overwork ourselves, do we?" Ryouga snorted in amusement.

"You just don't want to have to turn into a girl and go work with the _other_ _women_," he jeered.

Ranma glared at the bandana-clad boy.

"You want to make something of it, pork breath? If they knew about your curse you'd be barbecue ribs before the day was over," He spat.

"What was that, Ranma?" the fanged boy demanded.

"You heard me, pork chop." They both stopped walking and glared at each other.

"I've been waiting for this," Ryouga said with an undertone of excitement as he clenched his fists.

"Uh, hey guys… We're kinda close to the farm, you know. If people see you two fighting, they'll get the wrong idea," Kazuma said with a frown.

"I don't care," Ranma said coldly. "Piggy here has had an ass whooping comin' to him for a while now."

The two teens started to circle each other right there in the road. Kazuma shrugged, then glanced around and quickly realized they were already near the boulders where they would be meeting Kanami. He walked over to one and sat down on it, turning to watch the fight in disinterest.

Just as the two teens bent their knees and braced to engage one another, a young, feminine voice called out to them.

"Kazu-kun! Ranma-chan! P-chan! You're all back!"

Ranma and Ryouga blinked and turned their heads to see the small child walking towards them with a smile on her face. She waved at them cheerfully.

"Uhh… Hey there Kanami," Ranma said, awkwardly.

Ryouga frowned.

"Wait a minute. Did you call me P-chan?" he asked.

Kanami nodded enthusiastically.

"Ranma-chan likes to call you that, so I thought I could too…" she said as she finally came to a stop right next to the two.

Ryouga knelt down and got a stern look on his face.

"Kanami-chan, I know it might sound fun, but you shouldn't call me that. Don't call people things that they don't want to be called."

"Why?" the girl asked, tilting her head.

"Because it would hurt my feelings if you called me that, I don't like it when people call me that."

"You sure love it when Akane calls you that," Ranma snorted loudly. "P-chan."

Ryouga growled and stood up.

"If it wasn't for Kanami, you'd have a broken jaw," he said.

"Heh, maybe," Ranma said with a grin.

"Let's just go home already," Kazuma said with a sigh as he stood up and started walking away with his hands in his pockets.

"Okay!" Kanami said as she started after him. Ranma and Ryouga merely sighed, their mood ruined.

-スクライド-

When the four arrived at the clinic, they found Kimishima's jeep parked on the side. Ranma frowned.

"Maybe we should have just stuck with them," the boy frowned.

"Nah, I got to see that that old man was cheating me because we didn't," Kazuma said shaking his head. "I'm glad we didn't."

"Hm, well when you say that," Ranma said in agreement as they all made for the door.

Kazuma got there first and let himself inside, leaving the door open for the others, and when Ryouga, the last person in, shut the door behind himself, Kanami began speaking.

"So how much did you bring back this time, Kazu-kun?" she asked. "One thousand?"

Kazuma blinked and looked down at her.

"Err, ten thousand," He said, patting his pocket. The girl gave him a skeptical look.

"I'll believe you when I see it," she said patiently, holding out her hand. Kazuma frowned and reached into his pocket before taking out all of the money and holding it out for her to see. The girl took it and started counting it. As she finished, her eyes widened in surprise. "W-what did you do to get this much, Kazu-kun? Did you steal this?" She demanded. "You shouldn't steal from people, Kazu-kun!"

"Hey! I earned that money fair and square!" Kazuma said indignantly.

"He doesn't know the value of money," Ryouga explained to the girl. "He said he usually gets that much, but I'm guessing between the time he gets his pay and the time he gets home, he ends up losing it."

Kazuma flinched.

"I _know_ the value of money." He snapped. '_Some people just need it more than I do…_' He recalled incidents where he'd seen someone struggling to pay for something on the street, and slipped them a bill or three while no one was looking. It left a good feeling, but was sufficiently embarrassing that he didn't feel like explaining it to anyone. An incident where a boy no older than twelve was going to work in construction gear didn't have enough money to pay for the bridge toll came to mind, and he frowned. '_That old man was cheating little kids too! I should go back and kick his face in!'_

As he was overcome by righteous anger, a voice called him out of his retrospection.

"Kazu-kun, don't worry about it. You know better now, right?" she asked. He blinked and looked down at the little girl. "This means things should get much easier from now on, if you're not going to be losing money any more."

"I'm sorry," He shrugged. "I didn't know that it made that big a difference."

The young girl patted him as high as she could on the back.

"Like I said, don't worry. Things will be OK." She beamed at him and Ranma and Ryouga both had a sudden coughing fit.

Kazuma glared at them.

"Yeah, thanks. It's nice to see _someone_ cares, unlike two jerks I know."

"Yo, Kazuma! You're back!" They all looked up at one of the doors to see Kimishima prance in. "I got another job for us already, this one's much smaller and pays a thousand each, but it's tonight. You guys willin' to do it?" He asked.

Ranma and Ryouga looked up.

"Sure, why not. This morning wasn't enough to get the tension out," Ranma commented casually.

Ryouga snorted at that.

"We'll get our match sooner or later, Ranma," he said.

"We better," the pig-tailed boy agreed.

Kimishima nodded at that.

"Well then, see you guys tonight." he said as he turned around and left the room.

For a moment, no one made a sound.

"Ranma-chan, you want to go outside with me?" Kanami asked.

"Sure kid, why not," Ranma sighed. "It's not like there's much else to do."

"Can you show me how to do that funny stuff you do where you jump around? It looks fun," the girl said.

Ranma blinked and looked down at her.

"Don't you know about martial arts?" he asked.

One of the girl's hands rose up to her mouth as she looked up at the teen with curiosity.

"What's that?" she asked.

"I'll show you," Ranma said simply as he shrugged and walked over to the door and opened it.

"Be careful," Kazuma warned as Kanami followed him out.

"We will," the little girl assured him.

-スクライド-

"Damn it, I hate these freak thunderstorms!" Ranma-chan growled out as she ran into the clinic with Kanami in tow. Both girls were soaking wet. "How often does it rain here like that, anyway? The last time was when we first showed up."

"Actually, things have been pretty dry for the past week or two," Kanami said as she shut the door. "It usually rains fast and hard. It's always been that way," the girl said.

"You're kidding," Ranma said with a frown. "You mean it's going to do that more often?"

"Probably," the little girl said, tilting her head. "What's wrong with turning into a girl, anyway? I think it's kind of neat."

"A lot of things that you aren't old enough to understand," Ranma sighed. Thunder crackled in the background and the lights all went out at once. "Oh great! No power!" She complained. It took a few more seconds for the implications to hit her. "That means no hot water either!" she said with a growl.

"If you hurry, there might still be some in the water heater or pipes." Kanami said.

"You're right, I should go," Ranma quickly ran for the stairs and passed Kazuma on the way up. Kazuma blinked at that but merely continued walking down the stairs.

"Kanami-chan, we're going to be leaving in a few minutes," the brunette said. "We should be back before the night's over, though, so don't worry about it."

"Really?" Kanami asked. "Well, if you say so." She said. "I was going to go to bed in a little while, actually. Ranma-chan showed me some martial arts, it was fun but exhausting too."

"Okay then," Kazuma said with a nod.

Kimishima and Ryouga both walked into the room from one of the doors.

"You ready to leave, Kazuma?"

Kazuma looked over at his friend.

"Yeah. I was about to go get Ranma, but he just got back." He said.

After a few seconds, Ranma, still female, came back down the stairs.

"Either of you have a thermos I can use? Water's all cold," She said, miffed. Both shook their heads in the negative. "Damn it. I'm gonna start carrying one with me all the time."

"Watch your language," Ryouga chided, glaring at Ranma. Ranma blinked and looked at Kanami, who waved at her.

"Oh. Yeah."

"Even though the power's out, I was about to tell you that the water heater's out, too." Ryouga said nonchalantly. "We haven't been able to get hot water since you went outside."

"And the stove's electric," Ranma said through gritted teeth. "It's almost like someone is plotting against me!"

"Don't worry about it; it'll only be for a little while. I've fixed the water heater before," Kazuma said casually. "We'll just wait for the rain to stop before we go."

"Right," the redhead grumbled. "Like it'll stop anytime soon…"

And as if by magic, the rain outside stopped. Everyone looked at Ranma.

"…And the power will come back on?"

Nothing happened.

"Damn it," She said, snapping her fingers.

"Ugh, Ranma…" Ryouga sighed and covered his face with a hand.

"Oh. Oops. Heh." The redhead giggled innocently. "Erm, anyway, let's hurry up and do that job before the rain decides to start up again," Ranma said.

"If you're ready to go now," Kimishima said. "Nabiki said she'd stay here for now. Let's go, then," He walked over to the door and opened it. "Hmm, maybe I should get a different car if I'm going to be taking you guys around," he muttered as he walked out of the house. Kanami looked up at Kazuma.

"So you're going out again?"

"Yeah," He said as both Ranma and Ryouga walked out of the house. "Don't worry about us, we'll probably be back in under an hour. Hideki's is not all that far."

"Hideki? Who's that, Kazu-kun?"

"Oh, he's a friend of Kimishima's," Kazuma said. "He needed us to help him with a small problem he had in his neighborhood. Something about wild animals attacking or something," the boy snorted. "Anyway, we're going to help him." He ruffled her hair. "Don't give Nabiki any trouble while you're here, okay?"

"Okay," She said with a nod. "Come back safely, Kazu-kun."

Kazuma grinned at that.

"Nothing can hurt me," He said with a thumbs up. "So don't worry. See ya, Kanami." He turned and walked out the door, shutting it behind himself.

"…Kazu-kun…I mean it…" the girl walked over to a window and looked outside, to watch Kazuma as he hopped into back seat of Kimishima's car. He looked upset at something, and Ranma-chan, who was sitting in the front passenger side, turned around to stick her tongue out at him. Kanami giggled as the car sped off.

-スクライド-

"So the leader of this gang is an Alter User," Ranma asked as they rolled into an abandoned city district. The streets were mostly intact and many of the buildings were still standing, but the weather had worn them away. "And he's picking on some other guy's gang, which is made up mostly of a bunch of twelve and thirteen year olds. Daily beatings and stuff."

"Hideki's a friend of ours, but his group isn't exactly a gang. He keeps them out of trouble, actually."

"So I'm assuming that's why you gave him a discount," Ranma said. "All right, I'm up for rockin' some bullies," She clenched a fist and punched her other palm.

"I'll do this one free," Ryouga said. "Picking on the weak is despicable."

"Hey, those kids aren't exactly innocent either you know, they're _sorta_ in a gang." Kazuma said, grinning.

"Even still. These other people are in their twenties and what not, right? And I don't think you two could be friends with this Hideki fellow if he was a horrible person."

There was silence after that as Kazuma and Kimishima considered what he'd said.

"I guess you're right," Kazuma agreed. "I guess I'll do it for free too."

"Heh, fine with me," Kimishima said.

The car suddenly jumped and the engine died. All four teens were silent as the car coasted down a hill. Once it reached the bottom of the hill, it quickly came to a stop.

"…Well, at least we're almost there," Kazuma said after a whole minute.

-スクライド-

Moments later, Ranma, Ryouga, Kazuma and Kimishima were pushing the car down the street. After they hit a bump, the four teens all stopped.

"Heh heh," Ranma-chan chuckled. "It's a good thing we're close," she said. "But that was a good warm-up." she said as she stood back. Kazuma and Kimishima looked up at her like she was crazy.

"Pushing a car is a warm up for you?" They both demanded.

"This puny thing?" Ryouga asked as he stood up. "Guys, it has wheels. That makes it all the more easier."

"Hey, you idiots!"

A fat man with blue-green hair, a red vest and some green pants walked over to them.

"_Puny?_" Kimishima asked. "It's at least a few thousand kilos!"

"Yeah, that's right!" Kazuma said, looking at Kimishima. "What's with you, anyway, making us push this good for nothing thing? Trying to wear us out before the job?"

"Hey!" The fat man tried again, but no one paid him any heed.

"If we didn't, it'd have been stolen. And with all four of us, it wasn't that hard to push," Kimishima explained.

"Well you need a new one anyway, like you said," Ranma-chan snorted.

"Don't ignore me!" The fat man raised a meaty arm into the air, prepared to strike the nearest person, who happened to be Ryouga.

"New cars are expensive," Kimishima reminded with a frown. "If you guys don't chip in, I'll get another open-top one."

"What? You've got to be kidding me!" Ranma said angrily.

"I said, don't ignore me!" the fat man growled out as his fist flew at the lost boy. There was a noisy impact as meaty fist met tense muscle.

"That's ridiculous," Ryouga snorted. "You can afford one, I know it. And it's not more expensive to get one with a closed top. It's actually _less_ expensive."

"Well you heard me," Kimishima said as he crossed his arms. "If it's all my money I'll buy what I want—"

"YOU LOSERS!"

All four teens stopped chattering and glared up at the fat man.

"You want to fight or something?" Ranma asked with a sneer.

"This punk is mine," Kazuma said as he cracked his knuckles. "Nobody calls me a loser."

"Kazuma!" a male voice called out from the side. The four teens looked over to see a man lying on the ground in front of their car.

"Oh, Hideki," Kazuma said casually. "So we finally made it." As the four looked around, they noticed a bunch of kids lying, unmoving, on the sidewalk near the injured Hideki, and a group of men and women holding blunt weapons off to the side. "Okay, so where's the chump that did this?" He asked.

Hideki raised a hand and pointed at the fat man to their side.

"Well that's convenient," Kazuma said as he looked the fat man up and down.

"So you're an Alter User, huh?" Ranma asked, her scowl becoming an evil smirk. "We can have fun with this one, boys."

"You don't need to tell me that," Ryouga said as he cracked his knuckles.

Kimishima looked at them and then the fat man, and took a few steps away.

"Do you kids know who I am?" The angry pile of lard shouted at them. "I am Biff!"

"Biff, right," Ranma nodded. "Hurry up and bring your alter out already, Biff-o."

"Bring my alter out?" The fat man started laughing. Many of the thugs in the background seemed to take notice of this, but none of the three teens acknowledged him. "Fine! I'll crush you!" The fat man jumped back and was suddenly surrounded by a rainbow colored haze. He yelled out as chunks of the buildings, the street, and Kimishima's entire car all vanished and started to converge into a single construct.

"My car!" Kimishima yelled out in horror. At that point, all of the thugs started running away.

"This one's gonna be big," Ranma noted as she and the other two fighters simply stood back and watched. "Hey, Kimishima, get those kids out of here before he smashes them with his fat or something."

Kimishima nodded and ran over to help the kids all get away. The one called Hideki helped him as well and they all quickly cleared out of the area. The Alter finished forming in a matter of seconds, and a metallic tentacle with five digits protruding from the tip reached down and grabbed the obese man, then lifted up into the sky. The chubby guy laughed at them from his position in the air.

They looked up at the giant Alter; it was a giant robot of sorts with a huge club for a right arm, and its left arm was the metal thing that had picked up its creator. Its support was the four identical legs that jutted out from the bottom of a vaguely cylindrically shaped chassis.

"_Hammer!_" The large human cried out gleefully.

"Hmph, it don't look so tough," Ranma snorted. "Let's hurry up and get this over with,"

"It's been a while since I had an Alter Fight," Kazuma said. "I want to have fun with this guy."

"It might rain again, let's just get it over with. I'll fight with you tomorrow," Ryouga said.

"Heh, fine by me," Kazuma replied. "It's a promise, then,"

The fat man was mildly incensed by their banter.

"Bring out your Alters already if you're going to fight me!" He taunted. "I'll crush you all!"

"Heh, fine," Kazuma said as he was surrounded by a multi colored glow. His arm transformed as it did before and was encased in the shiny metal.

"Is that it? You talk about beating me, but you have that tiny little Alter!" The portly gangster laughed at them all. "And I don't even see yours!" He'd directed that last bit at Ranma and Ryouga.

"Good," Ranma said as she leapt up at the robot's head.

Kazuma followed by punching the ground and he landed on top of the club that served as the robot's right arm.

"I'd play with you but we're in a hurry today," He said as he punched its club-arm. Ryouga ran for one of it's legs and yelled out as he jump kicked it at the joint, snapping it as if it were tin foil. Ranma landed on its face and held up a glowing blue hand.

"_Mouko Takabisha!_" She yelled out as she launched backwards off the thing's round head. A Ki blast materialized at her hands and flew at its head, and detonated with incredible force as it hit.

"What the hell is going on here?" The corpulent man screamed as his Alter fell over. Its left arm was destroyed; one of its legs torn off, and its face was smashed in. It started glowing, and Kazuma jumped off of its arm in time to land next to Ryouga at the same time as Ranma. The robot exploded in a huge fiery display, and before the smoke even cleared, the overweight goon fell down to the ground in a blubbery heap, unmoving.

"It might not have lasted long, but it was worth it to come out here and embarrass that guy," Ranma said as she bent over and inspected the unconscious alter user lying across from them.

"Kazuma," Kimishima ran over to them and they all blinked. "I figured you would take a bit longer than that. Did he piss you off or something?"

"Nah, these two were afraid it'd rain or something again," Kazuma said cheerfully. "I got Ryouga over there to promise me a fight, though." Ranma snorted.

"Don't be upset if he doesn't show up," She said, laughing. "P-Chan over there is notorious for challenging people to duels and not showing up until a week after the date."

"Huh?" Kazuma frowned and looked at Ryouga, who was blushing in anger and embarrassment.

"Shut up, Ranma."

"He's got a horrible sense of direction, you see. He's only been able to stay with us now because I've been keeping an eye on him," she said, giving her rival a good-natured pat on the back. "Whole family is like that, too, poor guy."

"Ranma, I'm warning you…" The lost boy started.

"Well, someone has to fight me," Kazuma said, annoyed.

Just then, the four were blinded by some sort of light, and as they turned their heads to look, they saw a group of armored vehicles rising up from behind a nearby cliff.

As Ranma studied them, she found herself comparing them to what little she knew about war machines.

"APCs," she muttered. '_What are they, the defense force?_'

When the vehicles stopped rising, they were at least three stories tall and armored men stood atop them with guns trained on the four teens.

"_**We'll be your opponents.**_"

The four teenagers cringed at the loud, megaphone enhanced voice. They could each see a blue haired girl in some kind of white and purple uniform standing on top of one of the vehicles holding up a small device to her mouth.

"Who the heck are these guys?" Ranma asked as she stood straight and held up a hand to cover her eyes.

"That's HOLD, the city's police force," Kimishima frowned. "This is _not good_."

"What are they doing here?" Ryouga demanded.

"Who knows, but they're definitely going to cause us some problems," Kimishima sighed.

"I'll buy you guys time to escape," Kazuma said, retaining a veneer of calm. He looked over at Ranma and Ryouga. "You two don't need to get involved."

"You think we're going to run from this?" Ranma snorted and Ryouga crossed his arms. "Kimishima, you go on and get those other guys out of here. We'll hold them off," She said with a sigh.

"All right. You guys be careful," He said as he turned and ran. The three fighters all looked up at the girl with the megaphone.

"So you guys want to give us a fight," Kazuma called out with a grin. "I don't care if you're HOLD or whoever, there's no way you can match us!" He declared as he punched the ground and flew towards them. His fist crashed into the vehicle's wall and both Ranma and Ryouga took action after that.

"All we want to do is buy some time, don't hurt anyone too much," Ryouga called out.

"You're not the boss of me!" Ranma hollered back as she leapt up and held out both of her hands. "_Double Moko Takabisha!_" She called out, throwing twin spheres of blue energy at the soldiers. "Besides, they have guns!" Her chi attacks slammed into several of them, knocking them unconscious and sending the guns flying away.

"Ranma, you idiot!" Ryouga growled. "Fine, whatever!" He grabbed his belt and pulled it off of his waist, leaping at one of the APC's ends and swung his belt in a very wide arc, cutting off a chunk of metal and taking one of the tires with it. '_If I had my umbrella, guns wouldn't be a problem. I'll have to get a new one.'_

Kazuma landed on the dirt near where they'd all been standing a moment ago as Ranma and Ryouga continued to attack. A panel on one of the tall vehicles slid to the side, revealing its interior, and a green haired man in a purple and white uniform jumped out. Despite the commotion, he had an aura of unflappability. Kazuma narrowed his eyes.

'_He must be the leader._' There was something in the green haired man's eyes that made him feel extremely uncomfortable, but the wasn't about to let that stop him. "_Shocking First Bullet!_" The bottommost fin on his back vanished and he shot forward towards the other man.

Suddenly, a humanoid shape appeared in front of him and two ribbons shot out from behind its head at him. One of them wrapped around his right arm, and the other one slammed into his gut.

'_Stupid ribbons… How did he stop me so easily?'_ The brunette looked up at the humanoid shape in front of him and saw that it looked like a person wearing a straitjacket.

"Kazuma, hang on!" Kazuma registered Ranma's voice and looked up in time to see the girl directly attacking the Alter's creator, who only looked mildly surprised. She didn't waste any time and both of her fists blurred as she hit the green haired guy at full speed. Kazuma could hardly believe his eyes; the attack had barely lasted one entire second but the force of all the blows had sent the Alter User flying away. The alter immediately retracted the ribbon from Kazuma's gut and used the one wrapped around his arm to sling him, hard, into one of the APCs. He could tell that the blow to his head would have immediately knocked him out if he wasn't being powered up by his Alter.

He groaned as he fell to the ground and struggled to stand.

"Kazuma, are you all right?" He heard Ryouga's voice nearby and grunted.

"Yeah, I guess." He tried to clear his head and was able to stand after a few moments of trying. As he looked up, he saw Ranma fighting off the alter wearing the straight jacket. She managed to bat away its ribbons as it tried to whip her, but after only a few seconds of the ineffective strategy, one of the ribbons shot out and snaked around her torso, trapping her arms by her sides. The second one proceeded to slap her face a few times before the first slammed her into the ground.

"Damn, that guy always needs help," Ryouga growled as he reached up to his head and started over towards the two. He grabbed his bandana and flung it at the ribbon that was holding her. It cut right through the material, and Ranma fell down to the ground. Unfortunately, the bindings were not loosened, and the girl couldn't move from where she was.

The alter turned towards him, unconcerned with Ranma, tied up as she was. It immediately tried to wrap the other ribbon around the fanged martial artist, seeking to restrain him as well, but the lost boy merely laughed.

"You think I'm as easily defeated as _her_?" He growled. The boy roared and flexed and the bindings all snapped away from him.

"I'm not defeated! And who are you calling a girl?"

Ryouga merely ignored her, however.

"Take this! _Bakusai Tenketsu!_" The lost boy poked a spot on the ground, and an explosion of rocks and pebbles buffeted both him and the alter. Ryouga, however, was unfazed and continued to move while the Alter was surprised and took some damage. He charged at it and punched it in the face, sending it flying into one of the armored vehicles. It crashed loudly and left a large indent in the metal, before falling to the ground as Kazuma had earlier.

Kazuma whistled as he walked over to join his two friends.

"Not bad," He said happily. "I guess I owe you guys. This bastard might have gotten me if you two weren't here," Inside, however, he was frowning. _'I have to get stronger.'_

"Can you two hurry up and untie me?" Ranma demanded from the ground.

"Maybe we'll leave you that way-" Ryouga's retort was cut short as he suddenly flew backwards as if he'd been hit in the face. The boy landed on his back and both of the other teens looked surprised at where he'd been standing.

"Hey, what happened? You okay Ryouga?" Ranma asked, concern for her teammate overriding her ire.

"That hurt," the boy said as he sat up and wiped his chin. Blood started dripping down his chin from his mouth. "That really hurt."

"As well as it should have," Said a confident voice from the side. They all turned their heads to the side in time to see the green haired man in the purple and white uniform walking towards them with a cold look on his face.

Ryouga stood up with a frown.

"You should learn how to stay down," Kazuma said as he reared his right fist back. "_Annihilating Second Bullet!_" Another of the fins on his back vanished and he shot forward in a blaze of speed only to be slammed by an invisible force and knocked back, into Ryouga. The lost boy easily caught the alter user, but the momentum sent them sliding back a few feet.

"What the hell was that?" Kazuma demanded as Ryouga set him down. There was a flash of light followed by the crackle of thunder.

"Damn, we're almost out of time!" Ranma yelled out. "Hurry up and untie me you guys!" She wriggled around a few times, but the bindings didn't loosen at all. '_If I was a guy, I wouldn't be having this problem!'_

Ryouga ran over to her as Kazuma jumped for the Alter User again.

"_Obliterating Last Bul_— GURK!" He gagged and coughed as the unseen force once again slammed into him while he was in the air. Before he could even land, it slammed into him again from another direction. He fell to the ground in a heap just as Ryouga knelt down by Ranma. The lost boy was silent as he reached down to rip her bindings away, but before he could even touch them, whatever was hitting them slammed into him again, knocking him away from her. Ryouga flew backwards and landed in a heap behind some ruined concrete just as rain started pouring around them.

"Damn it!" Ranma growled out angrily as she squirmed around in vain. She looked around, but all she could see was the water pounding relentlessly on the ground, a dazed Kazuma and the male Alter User's boots as he walked over towards the rubble that Ryouga had landed behind. She looked up and watched as he inspected the area. '_That's right- he does't know about the curse! He'll never find Ryouga!'_

Suddenly, a small black piglet shot up at the Alter User.

"No! Ryouga! You idiot!"

"It's a pig." the Alter User said as he looked at the small animal. He was holding it away from him, and had its head held sufficiently away from his arms so that it couldn't bite him. "It must have wandered off from a local farm…" Ranma's eyes widened as she suddenly came up with an idea.

"Run, you stupid pig! They'll arrest you too!" She cried out desperately. Both the pig and the alter user looked at her like she was crazy. "You can't do anything once you're caught," She said in a low voice as she suddenly stopped moving. The pig looked at her with sudden understanding, but the alter user merely started to chuckle.

"It seems you have a fine grasp of the situation," he said as he calmly set the thing down. It immediately ran away and he only looked after it for a second before turning over towards her. "So you'll come peacefully?"

"Come peacefully?" She snorted. "You make it sound like I've already lost or something."

"Perhaps I spoke too soon." the man said with a small smile.

"Oh no buddy, the joke's on you, see. You'll get it later, don't worry." She chuckled again.

"Humor me, then," He said as he walked over to her and looked her over. He knelt down and lifted her chin so that he could look into her eyes.

She smirked at his uncaring expression.

"Don't lay a finger on her!" came a voice neither one was expecting. "_Obliterating Last Bullet_!"

Ranma and the green haired Alter User looked up in time to see Kazuma flying at them with his fist cocked back and a look of fury etched into his face.

The green haired alter user remained unfazed.

Before Kazuma could reach them, he suddenly slammed into the ground as the unseen attacker struck him once more.

That time, he didn't get up.

-_**Gray Skies Part 3: End**_-


	4. MSED

_-Nerima, Tokyo, Thursday, November 2__nd__, 1995-_

Akane stood before a three grave markers that were surrounded by various flowers. Engraved in the stone obelisks were three names, each belonging to the three whom had vanished on the same day, six years prior. There was a gentle breeze that ruffled her dress slightly. The flowers danced in the wind as the now young woman stood with an exotic flower clutched in her hands.

"It fell on a Thursday again…" she said quietly. "Ranma…wherever you are… I hope you're happy. Please continue to keep my sister safe." She smiled softly as she considered the other two people she had come to remember. "You too, Ryouga-kun. And Nabiki… I know it must be hard for you, to be in a strange place… but you're a survivor if anything…"

"Akane," Tatewaki Kuno's voice came off from the side. "Your father wants you to hurry up."

"Tell him that he can wait a little longer."

"Of course," the man's shoes clicked along the pavement as he walked away.

"Heh… Ranma… Can you believe it?" The girl had a wistful smile on her face as she knelt down and put her flower down on the ground. She stood back up and hugged herself as the wind picked up slightly, casting a slight chill over the memorial.

"I'm getting married…"

-スクライド-

Disclaimer: None of the series, characters, or locations mentioned in this story are owned by the author of this story unless stated otherwise.

GRAY SKIES

-Chapter 4: -

-スクライド-

Ranma looked around the darkness as the vehicle moved towards the city. She had been thrown into a small room at the end of one of the vehicles that was more of a cage than a room. It was a holding cell, and she was the obvious prisoner. As Ranma recalled for a moment how she had gotten into the position, she frowned. While she had no doubt she could escape if she needed to, they'd kept her restrained in that strange metallic ribbon.

'_Kazuma was beaten up pretty bad…__'_ She remembered how the Native Alter had looked as they tossed him into a separate vehicle. He was definitely unconscious and his face had numerous bruises. She was sure that he had more bruises and welts under the clothes where he'd been hit by the invisible alter. '_I w__onder what they'll do with us… They'll probably find out somehow that I'm not an Alter User. What happens then?__'_ As she considered that, she hoped Ryouga was coming up with a plan to break them out. There was no way she wanted to be subject to whatever horrors the state had developed in the forty some years she'd been gone.

-スクライド-

P-chan squinted up at the blue-haired, uniformed girl who had found him wandering around outside. She was riding with the green haired man who'd fought them all and seemed to be fawning over him. The man, whom he had by now learned was called _Ryuho_, seemed to be as interested in her as one would be a doormat. The piglet shifted his attention towards the green haired man, whom despite being slightly annoyed by the girl's presence was keeping a cool head. He was obviously intelligent and observant, but he had an air of single-mindedness about him that Ryouga had found common in Nerima.

'_I've got to figure out a way to get out of here__.'_

Ryuho looked down at the small black piglet and raised an eyebrow when he noticed that it was staring at him. Ryouga squeaked and the man lost interest and turned away.

'_He's going to be difficult…' _

-スクライド-

"They were captured by HOLD?" Nabiki asked, incredulous. Kimishima nodded.

"Part of the job was securing Hideki and his kids," Kimishima explained. "HOLY showed up and Kazuma said to leave it to him, but those boys of yours weren't about to sit back and let the action pass them by."

"I see…" The young woman sat back and frowned. '_That's just like them._'

"When I got back, HOLY had Ranma tied up and Kazuma was lying on the ground. I couldn't see Ryouga anywhere."

'_He probably escaped somehow,'_ Nabiki thought with a frown. _'Likely on accident, too.'_ She sighed and rubbed her temples. "What a quandary this is. How do you plan on getting them back?"

"I haven't had a chance to think about that." The man frowned and sat back with a pensive look on his face. "I never thought it would be possible for Kazuma to lose an Alter fight."

"Well, it happens on occasion." Silence permeated the derelict clinic as the two tried to think of ways to solve the problem. Nabiki suddenly looked up at him. "Isn't there a forest that makes alter power?" Nabiki demanded. "Kazuma called it the _Forest of Alter_ or something similar."

"Yeah, there is," He said, looking up at her in confusion. "Why would you want to go there?" Nabiki looked at him directly in the eyes.

"If we can go there and get some sort of Alter Power, at least that's another tool at our disposal towards getting those morons out of prison."

"I see what you mean, but…" Kimishima shook his head. "That's way too dangerous. Even the wildlife in that place has Alter Powers. Supposedly, no one who's ever even gone in has ever come out…"

"Well we'll just have to go around the wildlife to find this Alter generator." Nabiki. "Have to see if we can find something. Anything. It's better than going in half-cocked against an army and a half, especially when they have Alter users of their own," she said with a frown.

"Yeah…I suppose that's true," Kimishima sighed and stood up. "If we're going to do that, we should go right now."

Nabiki nodded.

"Every moment we waste, things could be getting further and further out of our hands," she agreed. "I'll go tell Kanami that we're going somewhere." Kimishima nodded and opened the front door, walking out. Nabiki stood up and walked over to the stairs, only to see the young girl standing at the head of the stairs.

"Kanami?" Nabiki asked as she looked up at the little girl's face. "…Did you hear us, then?"

"I-I only heard my name," the little girl said stiffly.

Nabiki narrowed her eyes, then chuckled.

"You… you said you were going somewhere?"

"Ah… yeah. Kimishima and I are going to go look for something."

"A-alright, take care."

"Yeah. You too." She turned around and walked toward the same door Kimishima had left through. '_Hm. She's a poor liar. I'm going to have to talk to her about eavesdropping._'

Up on the stairs, Kanami stared straight ahead as she struggled to stay standing.

"Kazu-kun…"

-スクライド-

Ranma grunted as she was roughly tossed into another small room and landed face down on the unforgiving cement floor. The door instantly shut downwards behind her and the room was quickly consumed by darkness. She wasn't even able to see right in front of her face as she looked around.

'_At least they untied me,'_ she thought with a scowl as she got up to one knee and held up a palm. A small blue sphere of chi appeared in her hand, giving the minimal amount of light needed to see around the room. It was what one might expect of jail cell; a small little box of a room with a raised flat block of cement covered only with a futon along the entire left wall and a western styled toilet and adjacent sink in the far right corner.

"Then again, I guess I really am in jail," She muttered. _'I don't believe this. How did this happen again?'_ She growled. _'Those assholes really just come out of nowhere and arrest people like that? Seriously, we haven't even done anything wrong!'_ She looked around. '_Hmph. There's got to be some sort of something in here that someone overlooked when they made the place… A loose brick or something, maybe I can open the door somehow…_'

'_I could try using a Moko Takabisha to bust the place down, but they would definitely notice that…'_ She stood up and surveyed the entire room, small as it was, for any sort of weak spot. To her dismay, she noted that while the ground was concrete, the walls seemed to be made of some kind of metal instead of brick. That coupled with the fact that she was sure she wasn't on the ground floor made digging out impossible. '_Maybe… I'll have to use __**that**__…' _

The crimson-trussed martial artist took a few steps looking around the room for something else. The sink only had one lever, and she was certain that it was only for cold water, so turning into a male would have to wait. The door didn't have any visible hinges; it'd smoothly slid up to admit her and slammed down to shut her in. It was like an automatic door at a department store, except made of metal and moving up and down instead of to the side. Indeed, everything Ranma had seen on her way to her current cell had reeked of futuristic technology.

It was becoming less and less likely that this was some sort of elaborate trick or hallucination, but Ranma didn't want to think about what it meant. Instead, as the girl yawned, she wandered over to the futon and sat down, letting the ball of chi fade away.

'_That's funny,_' she thought. _'I wasn't this sleepy a few minutes ago…'_ The girl sniffed the air around her and blinked. '_It's some sort of sleeping gas…_' she thought as she turned her body and laid down on the futon, yawning again. '_Bastards._'

-スクライド-

Nabiki narrowed her eyes as she looked out over the infamous _Alter Forest_.

Both she and Kimishima were standing on a cliff overlooking the seemingly natural formation. Although the sky was blanketed with dark clouds, the light of the full moon was enough for them to clearly see the center of the forest, in which there was a large grass covered mound with several large spikes protruding from the Lost Ground's upheaval all those years ago, along with a giant tree on the tip top of the mound. Everywhere else was nothing but dense vegetation; it was all a dark green color from the perimeter to just below the miniature mountain.

"I don't know…" Kimishima said. "This place is really dangerous."

"We don't have a choice," Nabiki said. "No one else would want to venture into the city to break some guys out of _Alter User_ prison, and replacing those three with reliable servants would be even harder. We have to take care of this ourselves." She turned around and started for the car. "We can search the perimeter first. Otherwise, we'll have to go in." Kimishima sighed at that.

'_She's right. This is up to us. What a hassle… And going into the city too, that'll be a nightmare regardless of whether or not one of us becomes an Alter User._' Once the two were secured in the car, Kimishima looked up as he started his engine. "If this wasn't for Kazuma…" He grumbled as he put his foot on the gas and started towards a visible dirt path.

-スクライド-

P-chan slowly blinked his eyes open. The first thing he noticed was that he was laying on a dresser. In his face was a huge framed mirror with some notes and pictures shoved into the corners of the frame. As the little piggy looked around, he noticed that the room he was in was a comfortable… _purple_ affair; there was a large bed with a purple comforter, the floor was covered with a purple carpet, the walls were a nice shade of lavender, and the fancy looking curtains on the window were also purple.

There was even a poster of a familiar green haired man in a purple uniform with his purple alter standing behind him. Morning light shone in through several cracks in the curtains, alerting the porcine animal to the fact that it was another day.

"Hmm… should I take it to a chef or skin it and cook it myself..?"

Upon hearing the familiar, feminine voice, Ryouga looked up, startled. He saw the blue haired HOLY girl from before just in time to see her reach down and start scratching his head.

She was reading a book titled _Japanese Barbecue for Dummies_.

"The time I spent outside of the city helped learn how to do that stuff, but…" She bit her lip indecisively. "What should I do? Would Ryuho settle for my average cooking?" She held the book down away from her face and looked at the piglet as she was petting it affectionately.

"What should I do? Cook you myself, or have a professional do it? Huh?" She bent down until she was face to face with the little porker. "You're so cute, though. It's too bad I'm a fiend for pork, really. Delicious, _delicious_ ham… bacon, sausage, _mmm!_ Why must pigs be so delicious?" She blinked as if noticing something for the first time. "And I wonder where you got that cute little bandana? Are you someone's pet?"

P-chan stared at the girl incredulously, his mind reeling with the thought of being cooked like some brainless animal by someone who was quickly turning out to be one herself.

'_You're asking me whether or not you should gut me or some random chef should do it?'_ He suppressed the urge to growl and bite the girl's face. Doing so would have probably screwed up his situation far worse than it already was. It would not do to have them thinking he had rabies or something.

Instead, he just settled for making some cute little squeaks and squeals while staring at her warily.

"Oh, you're so _cute!_" She said as she set the book down on the dresser beside him. "I have to start my shift soon, but don't worry little guy, I'll be back for you!" She grinned at him, licking her lips and walked away, out of his sight. "_Mmm_, maybe I should look up some recipes for a glaze at my desk… and since it won't do to be wasteful, I'll have to figure out how to use some of the more exotic cuts, and the bones… maybe I can use the cartilage? What can you make from that, anyway…"

Ryouga instantly hopped down and padded after her. From his vantage point, he was able to instantly notice just how short her skirt was.

Feeling that odd sixth sense prod at her, the girl stopped at the door and turned around, and blinked in confusion at the dazed looking piglet. There was a tiny stream of blood dripping out of its nose and she frowned.

"Uh oh," She knelt down to look at the piglet. "I sure hope you aren't sick. That'd be a nasty surprise." She grabbed the pig by the snout and looked it over. "You _look_ fine…"

P-chan snorted several times and started looking alive again, making more cute piggy noises. The piglet practically gushed cuteness as the blue haired girl watched in adoration.

"Aww, you're just fine. Hee hee, you'll make a _delectable_ dinner!" she said enthusiastically as she stood back up and turned around, pushing a button on the wall. Ryouga quickly noted the panel and noticed the door slide up as she walked out. The pig trotted out after her and started looking around, when suddenly the familiar feeling of being picked up came upon him. "You can't follow me out here, you're not even s'posed to be in the building." the female alter user chided as she turned around and set the pig down right inside the door. Ryouga looked up just in time to see her push a button on the wall beside the door. The pig immediately bolted out of the room just as the door started to shut, leaving a surprised girl in his wake.

"Hey, wait a minute! Come back here!" She yelled as she took off after it. Ryouga lowered his head and kicked up his speed with his chi, hoping his sense of direction would kick in soon. "Hey! Stop running already!" the girl cried out. Ryouga heard some people laughing as he rounded corners. He turned back and saw the girl was gaining on him.

'_Damn, she's more fit than she looks!'_ He picked up more speed and turned back around. The chase went on for five minutes, and his pursuer finally started to slow down.

"No wait, slow down!" The girl started breathing very heavily after maintaining top speed for so long. "Wait! Come back to me, _Ham-chan!_" she cried out.

'_Screw that,'_ Ryouga snorted as he upped the ante even more, becoming a veritable blur, and leaving a panting, disheartened girl behind.

As the tiny black piglet continued running, the girl stopped and fell to her knees and hands, panting and sweating heavily.

"…There goes… my romantic… dinner with… Ryuho…" She groaned as she fell forward onto the ground.

-スクライド-

"Well, we're here," Kimishima announced to his only passenger as his car slowed to a stop below a cliff, where hopefully no one would see it. Both of them were wearing more expensive clothing than before, at Nabiki's suggestion that they'd fit in more easily with a crowd that had money to spend. Nearby they could see the huge walls of the city standing as the barrier between civilization and impoverished, lawless suffering.

"I can see that, you dunce," Nabiki said, sticking her tongue out at the driver.

The young man rolled his eyes and killed the engine. He opened his mouth to say something as the girl opened the passenger side door, but stopped. As Nabiki shut the door, she noticed him staring straight ahead.

"Something wrong, Kimishima?" she asked with a raised brow.

"You sure you want to come back with us? You could stay here with what you have so far."

"It's become too dangerous for me to stay in this particular city. I'll have to come when I can afford a plane ticket." She turned away and looked up at the sky. It was partly cloudy, but mostly blue. "…They won't be looking for alter users on the mainland."

"That could be even more dangerous," Kimishima said as he finally opened his own side door and started getting out.

"Could be," she acknowledged. "But they don't have a police force specifically made to hunt Alter Users there. Hell, they don't even have any alter users on the mainland."

"You don't know that for certain," Kimishima pointed out.

"It's a better chance than staying here. I knew all of the consequences when we went to the forest. Now come on, we're here to do a job."

Kunihiko sighed.

"We still don't have a concrete plan…"

"It's good enough," Nabiki insisted as they started walking towards the wall.

"Just waiting around for one of them to _make a scene_ isn't a concrete plan," Kimishima deadpanned.

"Oh believe me, with those two, it is. Especially if Kazuma is anything like them. The explosions will be our cue."

"Right," he sighed as they stopped at the wall. There was a large screen in front of them and three other people in line before them. "You got the cards?"

"Right here," she said as she reached into her left pocket and pulled out two identical cards and gave him one of them. As they waited, the other three people all made their made their way one by one into the city. "It's a retina and fingerprint scan," she said as she walked up to the device in the wall. The device asked for identification in a feminine tone that was far from the monotonous one that Nabiki had been expecting.

She inserted her own card into the device and held up her hands to the specified area and stared unblinkingly as the device proceeded with its scans. A few beeps and blips indicated that she was done, and she took her card as it appeared in the slot again, pocketing it and walking towards the door as it opened. It shut immediately after she passed the threshold, and Nabiki looked around at the city in wonder.

Although the entrance they had used led to the residential area, the skyscrapers that had always been in the distance behind the huge wall were a lot closer now. She sighed as she looked around at the suburban styled homes that lined the streets; there was a bus stop, a bike stall, and a police box on separate corners within view.

Although the architecture was distinctly different from Nerima, she could pick out things that were definitely the same. Even though it was more modern than what she had been accustomed to living in for her entire life, it was far more familiar than the rugged wilderness she had been stuck in for the past few weeks. '_I __**could**__ stay here… but it would be risky…'_

"I'm guessing HOLY would be the largest building," Kimishima's voice said suddenly from her right.

"Hmm?" She blinked in momentary surprise at his presence. "Oh yeah, probably. If they're as egotistical as you make them out to be, then definitely." She nodded. "But the question is, would they hold criminal alter users there?"

"Eh? Why wouldn't they?"

"Well, think about it. HOLY is a subset of HOLD, a government organization. The _HOLY_ or _HOLD_ buildings would likely be full of nothing but bureaucratic offices and other such." She said, waving a hand. "It might be better to find out where they keep imprisoned alter users."

"Actually, I think HOLD's and HOLY's headquarters are the same. Since HOLD is basically a police force, it's probable that at least _a_ jail of some sort would be on the same complex, but since the city is very limited in space thanks to the walls, it's going to be the same building." Kimishima pointed out. "Besides, it would be safest to keep criminal alter users in a place where HOLY's alter users can respond quickly enough to keep them from causing massive damage to the city."

"Hmm," Nabiki held her hand up over her eyes as she looked up at the tall skyscrapers in the distance. "Well, you could be right…" She lowered her gaze down to the police box on the street corner. "Maybe we can ask for directions. How much money do we have?" She asked as they started walking across an empty crosswalk.

"Enough to rent a car, maybe get some souvenirs," He answered.

"Scratch renting the car. We'll take the bus and make some investments. The chief hasn't made good on his debts yet, perhaps we can do something about that, weasel some information about HOLY out of him."

"That's not all you want to invest in," Kimishima insisted with a smirk. "Thinking ahead already?"

She snorted.

"Of course."

-スクライド-

Ryouga sighed as he walked throughout the corridors of the HOLD building. The civilian clothes he'd managed to find in the lockers were starting to get itchy and he had the sneaking suspicion that they weren't exactly clean.

"It's still better than going around naked," He muttered. His plan to get hot water via the showers had worked, but he had forgotten the clothes aspect of his transformation and been forced to make due with whatever he could find. Ripping open someone's locker and taking a shirt and pants as well as shoes had been the easy part.

Now he had to figure out how to rescue Ranma and Kazuma, all the while with his horrible sense of direction. The worst part of his current ordeal, however, was that he had been wandering around the corridors for the past few hours and he did not appear to be any closer to his destination than before.

"Where the heck am I!" He shouted out as his frustration mounted. He fell to his knees and held his head with his hands. His friends were off rotting in cells, and there he was just wandering around, lost as usual. What use he was! It made him feel like tossing off a few Shi Shi Hokudan.

"Who's there?" Came an alert voice suddenly.

Ryouga's woe turned into hope and he quickly stood as a man in uniform walked towards him from the end of the hall.

"Excuse me!" Ryouga waved at the man and stood up.

"What are you doing back here?" The man demanded as he got closer.

"I'm sorry, but I think I'm lost," Ryouga said sheepishly.

"Yeah right…" the man muttered. "Alright kid, what are you really doing here? You could get in trouble for this," the man said warningly.

"But I'm really lost," the lost boy said frustratedly. "The last place I remember is, er, some big room with some exotic plants and a woman at a desk. I went to use the restroom and found some lockers," He said nervously. "Then I got lost trying to find my way back."

"…Kid," The soldier snapped. "Don't try to shit me. We're still in the locker room."

Ryouga's eyes widened and the boy looked around suddenly. To his shock, he noticed that they were indeed still in the locker room.

"WHAT? You've got to be kidding me!" The lost boy grabbed his head and screamed. "I'VE BEEN DOWN HERE IN THE SAME ROOM FOR HOURS!" Genuine tears started rolling down the boy's cheeks and he fell to his knees again.

"Uh…" The soldier blinked at his display. "Geez, you really are lost, aren't you..."

"Oh god, what have I been _doing_ this whole time?"

"Um…Kid, listen, I'll just take you back to the lobby, okay? And I'll forget about this. You won't get in trouble."

"I've been making a fool of mysel- Er, r-really?" Ryouga looked up at the man. "You would do that for me?"

"Sure. Why not," The soldier sighed. "Come on, just follow me." He said as he turned towards the door and started walking. Ryouga quickly stood up to go after him.

"Oh, you don't know how much this means to me, really!"

-スクライド-

Nabiki stared out of the window of the bus as it drove deep into the heart of the city. Although it hadn't been more than a month since she had last seen civilization on this level, it felt as if it had been far, far longer, and she had an oddly nostalgic sort of feeling. Perhaps it was the fact that even though for her it had only been two weeks, they were forty years in the future, and the city's level of technology was easily showing it.

Staying with Kazuma wasn't bad. Kimishima had enough connections to the point where it was more advantageous than coming to the city and getting some low wage job. But the convenience of the city couldn't be denied. The bus, cars, grocery stores, department stores, other modern conveniences and civilized people… all of these were things that had been common in her past, and even though it was arguably to her benefit, for a while, they had been ripped away.

Regardless, although her plans had been moving well along enough, she had been nowhere near ready to start a new life in this place, and although now it didn't appear as if she ever would be able to stay in this particular city, that merely increased the time it appeared it would be taking before she could do so somewhere else.

"Feeling homesick?" Kimishima asked from beside her. She snorted and didn't bother looking at him.

"Of course not. I came here to make a name for myself, by myself. I don't need help from those people."

"Heh. Of course," Kimishima chuckled. "But I have to say, this place is amazing. Makes me wish I had been born here."

Nabiki merely continued to look outside the window, contemplating their current plan. The police box had been most helpful in informing them where to go, and as it turned out, the HOLY complex was where they kept imprisoned Native Alter users until they were sentenced, as far as the man had known. An impromptu meeting with the chief of HOLY wouldn't exactly be welcome, but the man did owe them.

-スクライド-

"You're right here," the soldier said to the prominently fanged boy.

They were standing in the lobby of the HOLD HQ, and the young man from the past was thoroughly awed. He quickly overcame it though, and bowed repeatedly, thanking the man sincerely.

"Thank you so much, I'm sorry for the trouble," he said.

"Uh, yeah, whatever. Go home, kid."

"Actually, I needed to ask a question…"

"Well, the receptionist is over there," the soldier said. "I'd love to help but I've got work to do, sorry kid," The soldier said, ready to take off.

"Hey, Takeda." Another soldier said as he approached the two. "Who's the kid?"

"Actually, I don't know," the soldier said. "He was lost, that's all."

"Yeah, you really saved me, heh-heh," Ryouga said turning away. The second soldier looked at him and blinked.

"Hey, I have a shirt just like that," He said jovially. "Hey kid, you like _The Zone_, huh? It's awesome that some of you kids still have good taste in music."

"Eh, who?" Ryouga asked as he looked at the man. The man blinked as he saw the teen's face, and didn't register the question.

"Hey, wait a minute. Haven't I seen you before?"

"Er, no, I don't think so," Ryouga said hastily as he turned away. "Gotta go, thanks for helping me!" He said as he started walking away.

"Hey kid, hold up!" the soldier said insistently. Ryouga merely kept walking. "Huh. That was weird."

"Yeah, kid seemed a lot more polite earlier…"

"Anyway, Takeda," the second soldier said as he turned to face his friend. "You remember that kid from last night that got away?"

"The native alter with the super strength?"

"Yeah, that's the one. They were saying that…" The soldier paused in thought, before looking at his friend. "Hey wait a minute, didn't that kid look just like him?"

"Huh? What are you talking about?"

"He looked just like him," the soldier said, turning back around to look at the teen. The boy was walking around with a confused look on his face. "Wait here a second."

-スクライド-

Nabiki and Kimishima both looked up as the bus rolled away towards its next stop. The HOLD headquarters was easily the largest building in the entire city. And Murasaji was a huge city, as she had noticed that they'd crossed into the Downtown district at least twenty minutes before making their arrival. And not only was the building huge, but the architecture was completely different. It was a gigantic cylindrical tower that looked as if several discs had been stacked atop one another. For some strange reason some of the higher floors were much wider than the middle, giving it a top-heavy appearance, and Nabiki was sure that if it wasn't for the gratuitous amount of support cables, that it would have simply toppled over.

"They must have a reason for the odd design," Nabiki muttered. "Probably has something to do with Alter Users."

"We should have ridden the train," Kimishima whined. "I might not ever get a chance to do something like that again!"

"I told you it was more expensive," Nabiki snorted. "We're not here to waste time."

"Fine, fine," the young man sighed. The excitement of being in the city had notably started to build up in him. "But this place is huge. I hope the guy's office isn't at the top or anything,"

"It might be," Nabiki said as she started towards the building. "Come on already."

"Alright, alright." Kimishima sighed before muttering something under his breath.

"You only need to say that once," She replied as they approached the automatic doors. The doors slid open and the two walked in to find an impressively large room. There were some potted plants in the room, and a sparse amount of people. Two soldiers were talking and pointing at a young man whose back was turned to both Nabiki and Kimishima, and there was a woman with a child sitting on a bench by the side filling out some papers of some sort. The ceiling was at least three stories high, and the immediate above floor was cut off above the service desk with a railing. As the two approached the desk, they were greeted with the visage of a cheerful looking blue haired girl wearing a purple uniform.

"How can I help you?" the receptionist asked.

"Actually, we're here to see Yamashina Masatada. The HOLY division chief." Nabiki supplied her.

"Oh?" The girl quickly looked at something on her side of the desk that they couldn't see. "He's not accepting visitors today."

"This is really important," Kimishima insisted. "Isn't there anyway we can see him?"

"He's in an important meeting with the commander of HOLY at the moment," The girl said, giving an apologetic look.

"Is there _any_ way that you could tell him that we really need to see him?" The girl looked at them for a moment. Neither of them wore looks betraying their emotions.

"What are your names?" She asked, resigned to at least try for them. They didn't seem to be anything less than serious. Kimishima looked over at Nabiki, who frowned.

"…Tendou. Tendou Nabiki."

The girl's eyes widened at that, but she quickly covered her surprise up.

"He should be expecting us." The receptionist looked at them twice more before looking down at something on her desk.

"Right… I'll see what I can do, Miss Tendou…" The girl picked up a phone and dialed a number.

Nabiki smirked.

'_It seems my suspicions were right. The Tendou name does seem to carry some weight…I'm not sure why, but if people misunderstand, then there's no use correcting them. I should figure out why, though… it's not a common name, so it may actually be relevant.'_

"Sir," she said stiffly, "There's a Tendouu Nabiki here to see you." There was some silence for a few moments as the man presumably responded. Kimishima folded his hands and started thinking about something, and Nabiki took the time to look around the lobby some more and found that it had since been vacated by the two soldiers and the young teen. The only other person there was the woman with the papers and the young boy that was beside her. Now that Nabiki got a better look at her, she was able to notice the other woman's features.

She didn't appear to have ever gotten a haircut in her entire life, and her clothes looked poorly made compared to what had been the norm around the city. She seemed to be finishing up and soon stood, leading the boy towards the desk. The woman smiled at her as they both waited.

"Are you two here to join HOLY also?" The woman asked politely.

"Join HOLY?" Nabiki asked, surprised. '_This woman is an alter user?'_ Nabiki frowned. She didn't have the appearance of a fighter. "Oh, no. We're just here to see someone," She said honestly. "Wouldn't want to join HOLY anyway. They seem a bit restrictive, don't they?"

"Really?" the woman asked politely. "I suppose. I was told that I could get premium health care for my little brother if I joined," the woman admitted. "I guess I wouldn't be here otherwise."

"Premium health care?" Nabiki asked, confused. _'Isn't that already…'_

"We're from outside the wall," the woman explained. "They don't have healthcare out there."

"Oh, really?" Nabiki looked surprised. A native alter, to boot. Explained the clothes. "Haven't you heard what they say about HOLY out there?"

"Well yes, but…" The woman looked equally surprised. "How would you know about that?"

"I know a lot of things. It's my job." Nabiki said with a smile.

"Ah… well… Actually, I have heard those things, but it doesn't matter,"

"I see," She nodded. Of course. The two siblings were probably orphans. Nothing mattered to the older sister more than her brother's health.

"Tendouu-dono." Nabiki blinked at the honorific attached to her name and turned to look at the desk where the blue haired girl was standing and waiting for them. "Yamashina-shachou is going to take a few more moments with his meeting," She said. "If you'd like, I could give you a tour of the premises while you wait?"

"A tour?" Nabiki asked, looking at Kimishima. The man was looking at her intensely, but merely shrugged when he noticed that she was waiting for a response of some sort. "It wouldn't hurt," She shrugged. The blue haired woman nodded and turned to look at the other woman.

"Terada-san, someone else will be by to help you in a few moments," She said.

The woman merely smiled and nodded at that.

"Well then, see you later, Terada-san," Nabiki said with a smile to the other woman.

The woman blinked in momentary surprise, and then realized that the receptionist had just said her name. She smiled at the younger woman in return.

"You too, Tendouu-_dono_." She said with a small smile.

Nabiki smirked and turned away, walking after the blue haired girl with Kimishima in tow. Their guide was leading them towards an elevator. '_This could be advantageous, actually,_' She thought as she and her accomplice followed the blue haired girl in purple and white. '_The layout of our potential enemy's fortress._'

-スクライド-

Ryouga frowned at the two unconscious soldiers in the darkness. The soldier who had lead him to the lobby and the one that they'd found there had chased him into a hallway, at which point he happened upon a convenient door. Inside was a large custodian's closet, and as he stood cursing his luck at the dead end, the two men had cornered him in the room and ask that he stand down and allow himself to be captured.

"How did they figure it out, anyway?" He grumbled as he grabbed a nearby mop. After ripping off the mop's threads, he used them to tie the men's wrists together. Satisfied with the knots, he lumped their bodies in the corner and turned around, walking out of the room, making sure to shut the door behind himself. As he stood outside in the hall, he looked around.

"Now for why I'm here in the first place," he growled as he chose a direction and started walking.

-スクライド-

"…And beyond there you'll find HOLY's offices," The blue haired girl said as she gestured towards an open hallway. They were standing in a large, comfortable cafeteria. The majority of the people in the cafeteria were looking at them and whispering or mumbling amongst themselves. Quite a few people had pointed at them when they first arrived to the room. "HOLY member quarters are on this floor as well."

"You mean HOLY members live in this building?" Kimishima asked.

"That's right," The girl nodded. "The rooms are very comfortable, none of that military bunker stuff." She answered with a cheerful smile.

"Hn. What's the average age for Alter users?" She asked.

"Oh?" The girl looked surprised at the question. "Well, seventeen, I think."

Nabiki nodded to herself; If the upheaval had only occurred some twenty two years ago, then the majority of Alter Users would be that age or younger. Their guide absently looked at a clock hanging on a wall and noticed that almost twenty minutes had passed since they'd started the tour.

"I think the Chief should be ready for you now, Tendou-dono," the blue haired girl said, walking back towards the elevator. "Although he's the new chairman, his office is not in HOLY's department," she explained. "If you could just follow me,"

"Ah yes, of course," Nabiki said as she and Kimishima started towards the elevator after her. Once the three of them were on, the receptionist turned tour-guide pushed a button on the elevator and Nabiki felt it start moving up as quickly as it had before. '_This place is just oozing technology. If only Ranma and Ryouga weren't back-country hicks, they'd see their chance here._' She frowned. '_Now to figure out exactly what is going on with my name. Apparently, someone with the name 'Tendou' is very famous. Kimishima knows the name, the Chief of HOLY knew the name from how he reacted, and this girl started calling me Tendou-dono. I'm missing a very important detail here…_'

Things had been extremely convenient so far and while she wanted to believe it was her own plotting at work, she was no fool. Something outside of her knowledge, let alone control, was allowing her to bypass what should have been an immense obstacle. She had honestly not expected getting to meet the chief would be this easy. _'Perhaps there's a big, prestigious family with the name 'Tendou' or something, and everyone seems to think I'm a part of it._' Then for a moment, a thought struck her.

With 40 years behind her family instead of the two weeks behind her, it could be true. But who in her family would become so well known, to the point where the entire family was well respected? And why was she on the receiving end of such treatment? Were they expecting her, or someone from the family in general?

Her father had been near forty when she'd… left. That, and what she knew and expected of him prevented her from considering him for even a few seconds. Kasumi had a lot of hidden potential, that was for certain, but the older woman had seemed complacent in her lifestyle and content to marry a man, manufacture some children and call it a life.

That left Akane, or some obscure cousins. Or maybe even someone outside of her family. That was possible too, but she was sure Tendou wasn't too common a name. The sound applied to different kanji, so perhaps if she could find out the kanji that was used in this other Tendou's name…

"Come on, Tendou-_dono_," Kimishima said with a smirk. "You're going to get left behind." Nabiki jolted as she noticed for the first time that the elevator doors were open and the blue haired girl was walking away from them towards some other door on the other end of a hallway. The door almost instantly slid up into the ceiling to admit the blue haired teen. Nabiki shook her head at the door and saw that Kimishima was still grinning at her. She snorted and quickly walked past him, but he only took a second to catch up and started walking beside her. "What were you thinking about?"

"Three thousand," She said simply.

Kimishima merely grinned again and shrugged, deciding it wasn't worth it. When they made it into the chairman's office, both were impressed. There was a large window in the man's office that showed the entire city in the background.

The clouds had begun to thicken, despite the clear blue skies they'd seen earlier. Kimishima was literally awestruck by the sheer size of the district they were in. Nabiki merely blinked as she noticed what looked like a thirty story building somewhere in the distance that looked like a shoe box compared to their height. She quickly counted and recounted the floors again before nodding. '_I didn't know we were that high up. This place is taller than I thought. At least a hundred stories. If the prisoners are kept anywhere near this high, they'll definitely have a hard time escaping. Unless they can fly._'

"Thank you, Adjani," the chairman's voice could be heard to the side. "You may get back to work."

Nabiki turned away from the window, quickly taking in the rest of the grand office before her eyes landed on the other three figures in the room.

An older looking man in a HOLY uniform was sitting in a large cushioned chair on the side, while the blue haired girl stood before the desk of a familiar rotund man in a gray suit. It was the man that their currently imprisoned cohorts had rescued only days before. Hell, it hadn't even been two days – they were arrested the night after he was returned to the city. It was good to see that he was mostly in good health, although he did look a bit ragged. Adjani bowed before leaving the room, and the HOLY member that was sitting down also stood up.

"I suppose I'll be leaving too. I have a division to oversee," the man sighed as he started after her. Nabiki watched the man out of the corner of her eyes as he walked out of the office.

'_He's too old to be an Alter User_,' she thought with a mental frown. '_The upheaval occurred twenty or so years ago. He can't be less than thirty._'

"Tendou-san, it's good to see you again," the man said as Nabiki watched the door. She could hear the thinly veiled displeasure at her being in his presence again. "I wasn't expecting you to come calling so… _soon_, but a debt is a debt."

"Likewise, Yamashina-san," The girl said with a small smile as she turned to look at the man who's time she was taking up. "I see you're doing well. I'm glad for you."

"Let's get straight to the point, shall we?" He leaned back in his chair and crossed his hands. Nabiki suppressed a frown at the motion and the beer-belly it nearly exposed. "What can I do for you?"

"It's really quite simple," Kimishima said as he continued looking out of the window at the city life below them. "The guys who we had rescue you a while ago were wrongfully imprisoned just last night."

The man seemed surprised at that, but a thoughtful look appeared on his face.

"…I don't have the sort of power you need," he said with a frown, "Once they're in, the committee-"

"Didn't think you would." Nabiki interrupted with a sigh, raising a hand to look at her nails in an obvious show of indifference. If only she had a nail file… "Since you can't help us with that, could you answer a few questions?"

The man was only slightly bothered by her interruption.

"What do you want to know?"

"For one, who was that man just now?" Nabiki asked. Kimishima blinked and looked over at her.

"That was Martin Zigmar, the commander of the HOLY division. He is the first Alter User on record. Anything else?"

Nabiki blinked. That was particularly forthcoming of him…

"We need a device that can get information. We don't have any TV or Radio where we live. Or at least, we don't happen to own one, and if we did, we might not even get the broadcasted channels. Can't be too sure out there. We need something inexpensive."

The man snorted.

"TV or radio…" He muttered something under his breath about apes, but stopped halfway and cleared his throat. "Ahem. If its news and information you want, then you'll need something that can connect to the internet."

Both Nabiki and Kimishima stared at him. Though Nabiki masked her confusion well, Kimishima let it hangout where everyone could see.

"What is that?" he asked. "Internet?"

"The Internet… How does one describe that to a couple of _inners_…" The man muttered to himself for a moment. "The Internet… is an information network. Many devices can connect to the Internet. Usually by cables, although many devices are capable of using the Internet by establishing a wireless connection with nearby service areas or satellites."

Both teens got the gist of the message.

"So this _Internet_ is what we need?" Nabiki asked.

"More or less."

"Where can we find a device that can connect to your _Internet?_"

The man sighed.

"This is not my area of expertise. You need to be very specific with this sort of thing, or you could end up with something completely useless. If you have money, you can go into any electronics store and ask an employee." he said.

"One more thing," Nabiki said as she turned to look out the window one more time. "Why did that receptionist call me _Tendou-dono_? What did you tell her?"

The man snorted.

"I didn't say anything. She must have thought you were a daughter of that tycoon. We've been getting a few of those over here recently. Some from the Kiryu family, and by proxy, the Kuno family… Tendou happens to be the name of the woman who currently runs-" The building shook suddenly and both Nabiki and Kimishima stumbled over. The man was bewildered as he quickly sat up and rolled over to his desk, pressing a button on the phone on his desk. "_What in the world was that?_" He demanded.

"_The building seems to be under attack from an Alter User, sir_,"

"There's an _Alter User_ on the loose?" The man demanded.

"I think this is our cue to leave," Nabiki said as she stood up. Both the chairman and Kimishima looked at her. "Thank you for the wonderful, informative meeting, Yamashina-san. We'll be off to find out more about that Internet thing," She said as she started out of the office. Kimishima only took one look at the brisk pace that she had taken before shrugging and running after her.

"You sure this is them?" Kimishima asked as soon as he caught up to her in the hall.

"No doubt in my mind," Nabiki said as the elevator door opened for them. She blinked at that, not having pushed any sort of call button, but merely kept walking.

-スクライド-

Ryouga growled as alarms started blaring all around him. The hallway had turned red from the light, and his ears were already starting to ache from the obnoxiously loud sirens.

"Damn. Either they know I'm here or someone else is doing something." He blinked as he heard some mechanical sounds behind him, and turned to look in time to see wall mounted turrets with large barrels popping out of the walls. They immediately started firing blue energy bolts at him and the boy shielded his face as he jumped at the nearest one and simply tore it out of the wall before tossing it at another one hard enough to destroy it. There was a miniature explosion as one of the devices overloaded or something – he wasn't sure – and fire started where the device had once hung out of the wall. He barely registered the sounds of more turrets coming out of the wall before he yelled and jumped at the nearest one.

-スクライド-

Ranma groaned as she opened her eyes. Everything was completely dark, and something was roughly holding each of her arms and waist. Her entire body was sluggish and her head felt like someone had been pounding on it with a jackhammer. Sometime during the night she had been tossed from one cell into another, and then she had fallen asleep in the strange facility. Whether or not she was in the city, she had no way of knowing, as she had not been allowed to see outside at all.

"N-P-Three-two-two-nine," Ranma's head jerked up as she suddenly heard the voice of an older man. The sound assisted her in regaining control of her mental faculties. An immediate glance around allowed her to notice three things; that three men with masks and uniforms identical to the ones that the green haired man had been holding before were holding her arms and waist with some kind of floating hands, and the source of the voice was a man sitting at a raised desk. The rest of the entire room was cloaked in absolute darkness; it was as if she, the men in the uniforms and the man sitting at the raised desk were the only things that existed in the entire room.

"Your destructive ability has killed or injured seven people, and it has caused massive damage. We also have a report that links you with the kidnapping of the chairman of operations. For these crimes, you may receive capital punishment. But there is one way to save yourself. If you register as a regular citizen, receive proper education and join HOLY…"

Ranma stopped paying attention to the man's spiel and started examining her body more closely.

'_They drugged me,'_ She thought hazily as he continued to drone on and on. She could feel it – Her body was just feeling far too off balance and her mind was a bit more sluggish than usual_. 'It's nothing too bad, I could probably get it out of my system if I focused…'_ She closed her eyes as the man continued to drawl on and on in what sounded like some sort of recruitment speech to the world's saviors. '_Feh. No way I'd join a group of people who just show up and arrest whoever they can just for minding their own business. I'm not even one of those stupid Alter Users!_' The girl cried out as she let out a burst of Chi that knocked back the three men who were holding her with the floating disembodied hands. All three of them were knocked to the ground along with the floating hands, as she quickly assessed how her plan had worked.

"Get HOLY in here!" The man's voice cried out in a panic. Ranma looked around at the three downed men in uniforms and noticed that they had started to stand up already.

"Hey hey, calm down you old geezer!" She yelled out. _'Damn, that didn't get it all out of me. 's some potent stuff.'_ She rolled her arms about and worked out several kinks. "Listen, I'm perfectly willing to talk with you and whatever, but this one-way thing ain't working for me. Call off your clone thugs and I won't bother moving another muscle," She said, looking up at him. Everyone in the room stopped moving at that. The man seemed to calm down a bit as it became more obvious that she was not planning on rebelling in any way. The three uniformed men on the ground looked up at the man for instruction.

"…Stand back," The man said. The three clones all acknowledged the order by moving at least ten feet away from Ranma.

"Now then, here's what I have to say. I haven't killed anyone. I don't do stupid crap like that; it's totally against my morals." The man looked slightly taken aback at that, and Ranma tried to remember something about a kidnapping. She blinked and then raised an eyebrow as she looked at him. "As for the kidnapping, if you're talking about that fat guy, I helped save him."

"The reports state otherwise," The man started.

"Well they're wrong," She said angrily. "Now I've been playing the good sport here, thinking that maybe you guys would see reason or something," She said, pointing at the man. "But I don't think that other green haired guy is going to come in here to try and stop me anytime soon. That and the fact that I don't have any reason at all to stay here mean that I should be leaving now." The man narrowed his eyes at that.

"If you think you can escape HOLY…" He started.

"Then you are sadly mistaken," finished another person.

Ranma immediately turned around and noticed not only the three uniformed men but some other strange looking people wearing the same uniform or variants of it had walked into the room at some time. There was a strange sound and she turned back to face the man at the desk. Behind him, she could see light from another room and the silhouette of another person as they walked in. The door shut immediately behind them and as Ranma's eyes readjusted to the darkness, she was able to make out a familiar figure. The blue-haired girl from the previous night walked right up to the desk and started speaking.

"It might get dangerous in here, so you should leave," She said without looking at the man in the suit. He nodded and walked out the way she had gone in while Ranma started looking around the room. All the people in uniforms had surrounded her by that point, giving a very clear message. The blue haired girl frowned as she focused on Ranma. "Now, NP-3229," She started. "You have two choices as of now. Either become a regular law abiding citizen and join HOLY, or be sent to the mainland for forced labor."

"You guys can't stop me," Ranma snarled as she assumed a stance. "I wasn't prepared for you guys last night, but I'll go all out against your cheap tricks today."

"Is that so," The blue haired girl said with a half smirk. "Well then I think you've made yourself clear-"

"Wait." Everyone blinked and looked up at the source of the voice. Behind the blue-haired girl was standing the familiar green haired man from last night. "NP-3229…No, Ranma." Ranma blinked at that.

"How the hell did you know my name?" She demanded.

"Your friend, NP-3228, mentioned it." He said. "Now. Why are you doing this?"

"What?" Ranma blinked.

"Why are you fighting HOLY, when our intention is only justice? If everything you've said today is true, then you could easily rise up in the ranks of HOLY fairly quickly."

"Uh…" Ranma blinked at him. "What the hell are you talking about? Join HOLY?" Ranma snorted. "What kind of person would I be if I joined a group of people that arrested people for being born and then gave them the choice to either join them or do forced labor?" She looked at the blue haired girl. "If _any_thing I've said today is true, then with the fact that not only are you people holding an innocent person against their will, but you're giving them an ultimatum like that in mind," She resumed her stance and frowned. "I don't want any part of that."

"…I won't pretend to know your circumstances," The green haired man said. "But the securing of alter users is for their own safety, and that of others, and in the case of criminals, for justice. I can see where you would be hesitant to join us, but rest assured that our interests are your interests. We do what we do for the good of all."

Ranma snorted.

"Keep telling yourself that," she said. "Maybe one day, you'll believe it."

The green haired man stared at her.

"…I see. And even with all of these people surrounding you, you refuse to stand down?"

"Damn straight," she grinned. "Like I said, I'm going all out, and I'm leaving this place."

"I don't think I understand how you intend to do that," the man said as he was encompassed by a rainbow colored glow. "You've got nowhere to run."

"Heh, is that what you think?" She said, looking around at all the people gathered in the room as the standoff continued. _'They all had to come from somewhere. I didn't see a door open or close. Maybe if I go over there and sort of feel my way around…'_

She smirked.

"_Watch me!_"

And then Ranma suddenly leapt straight up into the air and most of the people in the room were suddenly already enveloped in a rainbow colored glow as she reached the peak of her jump and suddenly vanished. Every one of the gathered started looking around in confusion and alarm.

"Is it a _Harmonizing_ type?" the blue haired girl asked frantically.

"She didn't do this yesterday. Scheris, go check the readings outside." The green haired one ordered. The blue haired girl nodded at that and quickly went towards the door that she had used to get in. Ranma noticed this and grinned under the cloak of the Umisenken. She landed on the ground noiselessly and in one more bound was heading for the door that the other girl had opened. As she passed through the air and over the raised desk, a far off explosion rocked the entire room.

"What was that?"

Ranma smirked as the blue haired girl fell down to her knees in the doorway. She passed right by the green haired man and landed for a brief second before jumping over the fallen girl out of the doorway into the lit room. An immediate observation told her that she was at the end of a hallway, and she quickly noted a woman sitting before a computer screen that was showing the other room and a picture of Ranma's face as well as some other things that looked like they had come out of a science book. She snorted and looked back at the room she had just left in time to see the green haired man helping the fallen girl up while looking around.

"I think she's invisible," he began. "I had this distinct impression of _something_ passing right by me and through the door."

"What? That's impossible, don't they give mild sedatives to the captives? She's not supposed to be able to use her alter." The blue haired girl muttered.

"She's strong. Giving her a C-level rating may have been too low. But what was that explosion?"

"There's an alter user attacking the building from the inside…" the woman minding the computer said in response.

The blue haired girl stared at her.

"Attacking the _building?_"

"I see… at any rate, Kuno-san, you need to alert the commander that there's another native alter running loose. I'll go after her myself right now," the man said as he took off running down the hallway. Ranma fought the urge to snort as the man took off in a direction that was presumably 'after her'.

"Wait! Ryuho, wait for me!" The blue haired girl, Scheris, if Ranma remembered correctly took off running after him.

'_The 'alter user' must be Ryouga or Kazuma,_' Ranma thought as she too took off after the green haired man, Ryuho. _'I'll just follow you out of here, heh heh.'_

-スクライド-

Ryouga grunted as he tossed another bandana at the machinery that was targeting him, slicing it into two clean halves. Things had gone from bad to horrible to worst possible situation. One of the faceless soldiers from the previous night had positively identified him, and while before he had been enemy territory with an unaware foe, things were not quite as convenient now. They had to know why he was here; Ryouga wasn't suicidal and he had no desire to join HOLY or anything of the sort, which left the obvious reason that he was there to save his friends.

"They'll probably increase the security where Ranma and Kazuma are. Just need to go where there's the most resistance!" He yelled out as he avoided an energy beam from another turret. He ran at it and yelled out as he slammed a heavy fist into it, smashing it into oblivion. The damaged turret began to glow with the same energy it'd been firing at him before and Ryouga jumped away just as it exploded. "But I wonder, where are all those Alter User guys?"

-スクライド-

Ranma cursed as she looked around. She had decided to stop following Ryuho after they came into a big cafeteria like room with a large number of soldiers. He had gone into an area that was HOLY only as far as she could tell, as there were no soldiers or other civilians going beyond a specific point in the room- only the young teens dressed in the purple and white uniforms that classified them as HOLY members were meandering about in that area. She looked around and noticed an odd soldier walking towards the area as if he had the intent to go in and blinked.

"Excuse me, but this is HOLY only," a young purple haired HOLY member said as he approached the soldier from behind. The soldier stopped, and Ranma blinked as she saw what the soldier was looking at; apparently Ryuho had returned from the HOLY section with another, older man in tow. '_They're pulling all the stops here, aren't they?_' Ranma thought as she suddenly heard the sound of flesh meeting flesh. She looked over in time to see the purple haired boy flying backwards through the air and the soldier's elbow extended as if he had hit him.

She winced; the sound had been incredibly loud and she would not have been surprised if everyone in the huge room had heard it. The soldier had, at that point, however, leapt high up into the air extended his right arm as he was surrounded by a rainbow colored glow. His uniform vanished and the soldier in mid-air was replaced by the figure of Kazuma as the atoms that had once been his stolen uniform converged on his arm into his _Alter_ power.

"_Shocking First Bullet!_" He yelled as he fell down towards Ryuho. Ranma watched as the green haired man managed to summon his alter in time to block the native alter's attack. The purple and white humanoid's ribbons extended quickly and completely surrounded the man that had accompanied Ryuho as Kazuma's fist crashed into the other alter user's stomach. Kazuma jumped back after the hit.

"Thank you," the older man said after the ribbons retracted away. Ryuho clutched his stomach in pain, hunched over.

"It is my duty." Ryuho said before he glared at Kazuma. "Do you really think you can get away with what you have done here?"

"I don't care about any of that," Kazuma said casually.

"Is that how Native Alters think?" The older man said as HOLY alter users began to surround Kazuma.

"That's how I think! Now, come on, I'll kick your asses!"

"You sure are loud, aren't you?"

Kazuma turned to his side and noticed for the first time that he was surrounded.

"There are still idiots who pull stunts like this around?" A particularly rotund alter user holding a watermelon was the one to speak.

"You've thrown dirt in our faces," the blue haired alter user said angrily.

"You hit me without warning like that…I can't forgive that. Commander, is it alright if we take him out?" Kazuma looked over his shoulder and noticed the purple haired alter user holding his face where he'd been hit.

"It's fine. If you do it, do it all the way. Show him why it's not a good idea to start trouble here." The older man said in an authoritative tone.

"I think you're all forgetting something," Ranma called out as she appeared in the air above the purple haired boy. She kicked him in the back of the head and sent him flying forward. Kazuma sidestepped the flying body and glanced at Ranma from the corner of his eyes as she landed gracefully where the purple haired boy had been standing. "Or rather, someone!"

"Ranma, you're alright," The alter user said with some enthusiasm.

"You don't look too shabby either," Ranma smirked as she knelt in a Kenpo stance.

"You're trained?" Ryuho asked as he noticed.

"More than anyone you'll ever meet," she said with a grin.

"That won't help you," The rotund one snorted. "Even with two, you're out numbered here."

"And yet the odds are in our favor," Ranma said with a playful sigh.

'_This must have been what you were talking about last night,'_ Ryuhou said as he narrowed his eyes. "I see." He turned to his commander. "The other native alter user attacking the building is their accomplice."

"Yes, that's right," The older man said. "He was identified as the one that got away." Ryuhou turned back to the two before him. Most of HOLD and HOLY's forces were already going after the stray other native alter in the building. Both Kazuma and Ranma had used the opportunity to escape, and in Ranma's case, find Kazuma.

"Enough talking," came an angry voice from the side. The purple haired boy was standing up with a furious look on his face as he held his hand over a table. The table and everything on it dematerialized and formed into eight floating neon green spheres the size of a tennis ball. Two balls shot towards both Ranma and Kazuma, spurring everyone else into action.

Ranma and Kazuma dodged the incoming spheres in a series of flips. Kazuma frowned at the number of _Alters_ around them. Various supernatural creatures and objects were appearing en masse, all to fight just two enemies. The only two who had not yet formed alters were the blue haired girl and the commander.

'_We're strong, but all it took last night was that green haired freak to beat us. We have to get out of here,_' Kazuma thought. He looked around and spotted a nearby elevator open, revealing a woman, who looked surprised as she spotted the fighting. _'That's our chance!'_ he punched the ground and flipped through the air to the elevator, dodging two purple ribbons just as he did so.

Ranma spotted the movement out of the corner of her eye and realized what her friend's plan was. '_Saotome Secret Technique it is then,_' she thought as she moved to follow. The large man, who'd shoved his fist into the watermelon as he went after her, blinked as she seemingly vanished again. The girl reappeared at the elevator doors, and they opened in time for Kazuma to land inside the elevator. The Alter User immediately punched the floor of the elevator cart, and it shattered, allowing him to fall down the shaft.

"They're insane!" The fat one yelled out as he pointed at them.

Ranma quickly jumped down after the _Native Alter_ user, ignoring the shout. Ryuhou quickly ran over to the elevator and looked down, but could only see the shaft.

"Let's go." He said.

"You can't mean through there, right?" The fat one demanded again. Ryuho stood up and turned around to face them.

"Of course not. We do have more civilized ways of going after them," He snorted.

-_**Gray Skies Part 4: End**_-


	5. The Divide

Ono Tofu sighed as he looked around the lobby of the clinic that had served as his small family's home for two years, the last of the moving boxes sitting next to him. As altruistic as his goals had been, coming out here to the damaged sectors of Kanagawa to help the impoverished who'd suffered more losses from the hurricanes and quake than anyone else, it was a hard life, and he would not be able to provide for them with the little bit of money they were making now that the newly reconstructed government, _Logos_, had cut its funding to him. His family would not be able to survive, and the battle against poverty outside of the special economic districts was a losing one.

It was time to head to the city.

Positions needed to be filled, and people were scrambling for a man of his expertise. People similarly talented were being offered high paying positions all over the country, with priority given to doctors and scientists whose work required specialized skills that were cultivated after years of dedicated study and application.

It was easy to see what would become of those who couldn't fit into the new society. One only needed to look outside to see them meandering about.

"Hey dad." A teenaged girl walked into the lobby and looked at him. "What should I do with the clothes that were donated in boxes upstairs?"

Tofu looked at his second oldest daughter of fifteen years with a nostalgic smile. She looked so much like her mother.

"Just leave them there. Maybe someone will be able to make use of them." The man sighed and gave the lobby one more once-over. "Go get your sisters. We're leaving."

"M'kay," the girl said as she turned around and walked back through the door she'd come.

Tofu sighed and looked down at the boxes around him.

"Kasumi… was this the right choice?"

-スクライド-

Disclaimer: None of the series, characters, or locations mentioned in this story are owned by the author of this story unless stated otherwise.

GRAY SKIES

-Chapter 5: The Divide

Wow… look at that. An entire year and a third. Well, here it is.

-スクライド-

Nabiki and Kimishima stepped off of the elevator and looked around. They were greeted with the sight of rows and rows of cars.

"We went too far down. This is the garage." Nabiki said as she turned around, prepared to get back on. There was a sudden nearby crash, and both whipped their heads to the direction where it had come from. Another elevator's doors exploded outwards and two shapes emerged from the shaft. The dust cleared to reveal two familiar shapes. "Ranma? Kazuma?"

Both of them turned to look at her.

"Nabiki! Kimishima!" Ranma called out as she jogged over to them. Kazuma merely walked after her. "What are you two doing here?"

"We came to get you." Nabiki frowned. "Where's Ryoga?"

"Ryoga? Uhhh, I think that was him causing explosions before," the female martial artist said.

"Oh? That's right, he wasn't captured?" Nabiki asked.

"Er, no," Ranma blinked. "He came separately… I think."

"You think?" Nabiki groaned. "Why am I not surprised…"

"Well, those guys upstairs did say it was him," Kazuma frowned.

"That's right." Ranma nodded.

"Wait a minute," Nabiki frowned. "Guys upstairs?"

"Uh, yeah, we ran into a bunch of HOLY bastards," Kazuma said, turning away. "Which reminds me, we should be leaving. Hey, Kimishima, do you think you could drive one of these?" He asked, looking around.

"We can't leave without Ryoga," Ranma spoke up.

"I guess not," Kazuma said with a frown. "How will we find him, though?"

"Give me a moment to think on this," Nabiki said as she frowned and turned away.

"If we had rented a car, we'd be able to just leave, as soon as we found him." Kimishima whined. "You should have listened to me!"

"Oh shut up already," Nabiki snapped. "All right, I have a plan. Ranma, you're going to have to use the Umisenken."

"Against guys with guns and super powers? Of course, but…" Ranma frowned. "That guy with the green hair was able to sense me go by him somehow. He shouldn't have at all, but." She narrowed her eyes. "These alter users might have some other way of sensing people."

"It may have been a fluke." Nabiki said. "Anyway, Ranma, you're going to have to find Ryouga on your own. Kazuma is going to have to stick with me,"

"What? Why?" Kazuma frowned. "I want a piece of the action too."

"You can't turn invisible like Ranma can. Plus, Ranma still has the chance to switch to his boy form if they haven't seen that. Ranma, once you've found Ryoga, you can just throw some water on him and get out of there on your own. Kimishima will be waiting for you in the lobby, and you guys can leave at your leisure."

"Where will you two be then?" Ranma asked.

"We'll be going for an exit."

"Won't that be dangerous for you?" Kimishima asked. "If they find out about your ability, or connect you to Kazuma at all."

Ranma and Kazuma blinked.

'_Ability…?'_ Ranma frowned and looked over at the middle…youngest, now, Tendo sister.

"We don't have any other options at the moment." Nabiki looked over at Ranma and Kazuma. "We should move right now. They probably know where you two are."

"I don't like this plan." Ranma frowned, then shook her head. "But I can't think of anything else. I'll see you all in a little while," The girl vanished from their sight at that point and Kimishima looked over at Nabiki.

"I'll go upstairs then." He said, and walked back towards the elevator that they had gotten off of. Kazuma looked over at Nabiki.

"How are we gonna leave then?"

"One of these," Nabiki said, looking over all of the cars in the area.

"You can drive?"

"If things haven't changed too much since before." She spotted a blue convertible with the top open. _'Someone must not worry about their car getting stolen. Too bad it's about to be.'_ She thought as she led the alter user to it. _'Still, it might have an alarm or something.'_ She held up a hand to stop the man with her. "Hold on a second."

"What is it?"

Nabiki was suddenly enveloped in a rainbow aura, and Kazuma blinked.

"Hey wait a minute! You're an alter user?"

"That alter forest you were talking about earlier was… convenient, in a way." She said, putting a hand on the car door. _'Though I had intended for Kimishima to bite the bullet there… this happened instead. Can't say it doesn't have its advantages, but being a marked woman is definitely something I could have done without.'_

Kazuma blinked again.

"But how did you go in there? It's supposed to be extremely dangerous."

"I got lucky." She looked into the car. "I don't think there's an alarm." She grabbed the wheel and the glow around her intensified before the car suddenly turned on. Nabiki smirked.

Kazuma looked at the car in surprise and then at her.

"How'd you get it to work?"

"It's all electrical, the whole car," She said. "The owner was extremely careless for some reason."

"Your alter ability?" Kazuma asked.

"I'm not quite sure myself at this point, but it looks like I can manipulate electronic devices… among other things,"

Kazuma blinked.

"Like what?"

"That's a secret," she smirked as she opened the driver's side door. "Get in."

"Heh, right," Kazuma hopped into the passenger side as Nabiki sat down. She looked at the dash and was relieved that most of it resembled what she knew. There were a few more electronic devices in place, but they didn't interfere with her driving. She backed the car out of its space and drove away.

Seconds later, a number of men in uniforms burst from the stairwell.

-スクライド-

"No sign of them down there?" Ryuho frowned at his radio. "Understood." He looked up at the other alter users with him. "They seem to have escaped on foot. Elian, can you find them?" The alter user in question was a young teen with messy black hair. The top half of his body was enveloped in a floating green sphere of sorts and there was something of a computer screen and keyboard in front of him. He typed for a few seconds before answering.

"They disappeared seconds after they made it to the garage," the boy said. "I was able to detect another alter user, but all of the surveillance data was scrambled immediately afterwards."

"_Another_ alter user?" Ryuho frowned. "They're even more coordinated than I'd thought. What about the one rampaging throughout the building?"

"He's still there, but he's moving erratically. He doesn't seem to have any real destination. His alter power seems to be either high B or low A level, so HOLD is not equipped to engage him."

"I'll have to intercept him myself again," Ryuho said.

"But Ryuho, you don't have to fight him yourself! There's plenty of other alter users here who can fight an A level alter," Scheris said. Some of the HOLY members around all made sounds of agreement. Ryuho avoided looking at the blue haired girl and shook his head.

"He is my responsibility. It is because I could not capture him before that he is here… attacking the _building_." Ryuho looked over at their leader. "Commander?"

"Go ahead, you should be able to contain him yourself."

Ryuho nodded and started walking away.

"But commander! Who will search for the escapees?"

"You and Tachibana can join the search for those other alter users. I'm going to have HOLD close the city's walls." Scheris posture slumped a bit when Zigmar started walking away in different direction than Ryuho. The blue haired girl sighed.

"Yes sir…"

-スクライド-

Ranma sighed in relief as he dried himself off. It was good to be a man again.

'_I'm gonna have to keep this up until I find P-chan, though.'_ He tossed the paper towels into the trash and pulled the door open, revealing a portly man in business attire standing on the other side. The man looked surprised as Ranma walked right by him, unseen.

"But I didn't push the button…" He heard the man mutter, as he stood there looking confused.

Ranma shrugged as he kept walking.

-スクライド-

"Damn it, why does every place in this building look exactly the same?" Ryoga looked around the corridor he was in and scowled. "I've got to find those two and get out of here already!"

"You there! Stop!"

Ryoga blinked when he heard the familiar voice. He turned around and noticed the green haired alter user in a HOLY Uniform standing there.

"You've made a grave error, invading Holy's central headquarters like this and assaulting several non-alter users of Hold."

"Tch. You know what, you might be right. But you know, you're guilty of the same thing. Assaulting non-alter users anyway." Ryuho raised a brow, but Ryoga continued explaining before he could say anything. "Ever since I was sent to this stupid 'Lost Ground' place, everyone has been mistaking me for one of those Alter Users, which is really starting to piss me off. I trained in martial arts for my entire life to be as strong as I am. What I have isn't some cheap _birth defect_." The fanged boy smirked.

"If you think I'll believe that the unnatural strength you have is simply a result of lifelong training in the martial arts, you're daft." Ryuho's body lit up in the rainbow aura of alter and destroyed turrets started de-materializing before reforming into the humanoid alter, Zetsuei. "If you come peacefully right now and allow yourself to be detained, then there will not need to be a repeat of last night."

"There won't be a repeat of last night no matter what," Ryoga snarled and he quickly reached up to his bandana. He pulled it off and flung it like a buzz saw at the green haired teen. Two purple ribbons extended from the alter's collar in a criss-cross shape to block the bandana, but the spinning motion of the bandana caused it to wrap around the ribbons tightly, tying them together. By then, Ryoga had already flung several more of the bandanas at the holy officer and was running towards him. The ribbons moved to block what they could and Ryuho dodged the ones that got through.

"Got you!" Ryuho looked up in time to notice Ryoga had gotten past his alter and was swinging a belt at him. Ryuho barely managed to duck under the belt's arc by inches. With a mental command, Zetsuei leapt at Ryoga and jump kicked him in the back of the head. The attack didn't even faze Ryoga, who simply turned and swung his belt at his new opponent. Zetsuei blocked with its own ribbons, which seemed to be made of a metallic material that Ryoga couldn't identify, but his belt simply cut through them and landed a clean hit on the alter's shoulder, effortlessly slicing through whatever material it was made of and taking off a sizeable chunk of...

He hardly noticed Ryuho's gasp of shock because he had to suppress his own at what greeted him. The inside of the alter was nothing but a glowing myriad of color that resembled the aura of an alter user. He glanced at the material on the ground and saw it disintegrate.

'_Well, this is a whole new level of weird,'_ He thought, looking at the alter's huge gaping wound. _'Not exactly sure what I was expecting, but it sure wasn't that.'_

A completely different string of thoughts was flowing through Ryuho's mind.

'_He cut through Zetsuei with a piece of clothing…'_ The green haired teen cautiously backed away. _'I ranked this one a high C level last night, but he's displaying at least mid B level ability right now.'_ He narrowed his eyes and willed Zetsuei to reform the chunk of matter that had been cut off. The bandannas that were tied onto it quickly dematerialized and reformed into a new shoulder.

"Oh no you don't," Ryoga leapt at Zetsuei with a fist cocked back, but the alter had already repaired itself and very wisely moved to dodge the incoming punch. Ryoga's attack kept going and crashed into the thick steel wall, punching a very deep indentation into it. Ryuho winced as he saw the thick metal wall crumble around his enemy's arm like simple aluminum foil.

'_To think that we were wrong about the two of them… just how strong is this… Ryoga? He seems to be the other one NP3228 was ranting about during the interrogation, anyway. There is also another unknown alter user at this point... The one in the garage, who was able to scramble Elian's data… just what are we dealing with here? How could people like this have gone unnoticed for so long?'_

"I won't miss again," Ryoga said as he pulled himself out of the wall.

Ryuho nodded.

"You won't even get the chance to launch another attack," He said. Zetsuei's ribbons receded into its collar and the half mask covering the left side of its face pulled into the side of its head, revealing the entire face.

"That's for sure," a masculine voice announced and before the green haired teen could react, his back exploded with pain. Ryoga watched Ranma fade into view, his fists a blur as they relentlessly struck the HOLY officer's unguarded back nearly a hundred times in a single second. Ryuho fell forward, unconscious from the pain before he hit the ground. Zetsuei dematerialized moments later.

"Hey, I was about to kick his ass," Ryoga scowled as he looked over his eternal rival.

"Nuh-uh, he was about to pull out whatever he did last night, I'm sure of it. You'd have lost then,"

"No way! I had a strategy planned out and everything. I didn't ask you to step in!"

"So what? I did, and he's done." Ranma said, shrugging. "Listen, everyone's waiting for us. We've got to hurry up and get the hell out of here. This ain't the time for games."

"Wait, what? _Everyone?_"

"Kimishima and Nabiki showed up, and Kazuma was able to bust out," Ranma said. "Kimishima's waiting for us in the lobby, but the other two are already on their way out of the city." Ryoga considered the information for a moment before nodding.

"Fine, then let's go," Ryoga said, turning around and walking forward.

Right into the wall. He crashed and nearly fell backwards after losing his balance.

"I'll lead the way," Ranma sighed. He looked down at the fallen Ryuho and frowned. '_His body was a lot weaker than I'd thought… that alter of his… Is that all these guys use?_' He smirked. '_If all you have to do to beat them is take down their main body, then Alter Users that don't fight like Kazuma are pretty worthless, eh?_'

-スクライド-

Nabiki looked up through the windshield at the cloudy gray skies with a sigh, and her body glowed with a soft, rainbow aura for a moment. The convertible responded to her will by closing, and she raised the windows. Kazuma looked around the car in surprise.

'_It was a little sunny earlier, too.'_ There had been clouds when they got there, sure, but ever since she'd been in that chairman's office, they had been building up and now it was going to rain.

"Wow, it can do that sort of thing too?" Kazuma sounded particularly excited as he looked around at the car. "This must have been an expensive car! Can we keep it?"

"I doubt it. All vehicles in the city are registered to a certain owner, and there's no telling how else they're tracking this thing nowadays. There could be some computer that knows exactly where the car is right now. It'd be just our luck to take something nice like this home, and have the military knocking on our door in the morning."

Kazuma frowned.

"If that's true, why'd we take it? They know exactly where we are!"

Nabiki looked over at him.

"Because it'd take too long on foot. We're kind of in a hurry. If they spotted us while we were on foot, the chances of getting away would drop to near zero. Obviously they aren't coming after us right now so they haven't thought to look for the signal of a stolen car."

"…Eh." Kazuma sat back, turning to look at the scenery that they passed by.

Nabiki glanced out over the edge of the freeway bridge she was on. To her right was an unforgiving wilderness that had taken over the remnants of a once great society. Ruined buildings were littered about, stretching far into the background, covered with vines and the like, and paved roads were cracked and disheveled with wild flowers and bushes growing all along them. The piles of garbage that constituted as homes for some of the people outside were littered about just outside the walls, but she couldn't see any people from the height they were at.

The young woman glanced to her left and looked out past Kazuma, who had a thoughtful look on his face. Sky scrapers reached high into the sky – namely that of HOLD's offices and especially its main headquarters, and the city stretched out as far as she could see. Thanks to the clouds, car headlights were on and some of the buildings were starting to light up as well. She knew that there were several residential districts near the entrance that she'd used, but you really couldn't see them just from looking from where she was.

Despite being surrounded by a ruined landscape, a huge city had managed to spring up and flourish. On the other hand, people outside suffered a hard life, and while many lacked money, causing them to fight over food and clothes, in a select few areas, people had been able to come together and make something comparable to the farming communities that had pervaded Japan for centuries. The only difference was that now, there were many times more food thieves, as well as the new alter users running about, and most of the landscape was littered with constant reminders of what had happened thirty years ago.

'_I really, really need to get back to civilization.'_ She focused on the road ahead of her and noticed drops of water pouring down the windshield.

-スクライド-

Kimishima looked up from the newspaper he was reading to see a male Ranma walk into the lobby through the main entrance, a small black piglet in his arms.

"Ah, you made it! You ready to go then?" The man asked as he stood up.

"The sooner the better." Ranma said.

"Okay then, let's get out of here already." They both turned and started walking towards the door of the building.

-スクライド-

Ryuho groaned and looked up. Sitting above him was his blue haired coworker, Scheris.

"…ho! Ryuho, are you all right! Can you hear me? What happened to you?"

The green haired alter user coughed up a bit a of blood, and the crimson liquid flowed down the side of his mouth. Scheris' face turned pale.

"I… let my guard down…" His body shook as he coughed up more. _'Disabled so __**easily…**__'_ He looked up at his blue haired comrade as he felt his consciousness slipping away again. "There's… _another_ alter user…" The world faded away as Scheris shouted at him.

"What? Ryuho, hang in there! I'll get you to the hospital right away!" The blue haired girl took a radio from her waist and started shouting into it immediately as a rainbow glow enveloped her body. "Ryuho's been severely injured! Please, send someone to corridor AD4…"

-スクライド-

Nabiki frowned as she slowed down her car. The traffic had suddenly become heavy, and as far as she could see in front of her, cars were stopped. The cars just in front of her were slowing down to a stop as well, and she made sure to do so herself. She turned around and looked out the back window. Just then, the radio, which had been playing some low jazz music, changed its tune. Hearing the voice of a man in what sounded like some official announcement, Nabiki looked at the radio and, seeing a volume knob, turned it up.

"…_rupt_ _this program to report that a number of terrorists, all presumed to be Alter Users, have attacked HOLD's headquarters. Severe damages have been reported, though the number of injured and casualties hasn't been released. As a result, all city exits have been closed in an attempt to contain the terrorists, who may be attempting to escape through…"_

"Oh damn," Nabiki muttered as she looked ahead. That was why the traffic was heavy. A city exit was one of the next few off-ramps, as they _had_ been attempting to escape through them. _'But really, __**terrorists?**__'_ She scowled as she looked ahead of them. Blinking lights could be seen as police and military cars started going down the opposite side of the road in the distance. "They're inspecting cars… damn!"

"Heh, is that so…" Kazuma looked at the carpool lane to their left, and saw that it was mostly empty. "I've got a plan. You're gonna need to trust me on this one,"

"What?"

"We'll go towards the exit as fast as we can, and when we get to it, I'll slam us out of here! We'll fly over the exit. They won't be able to stop us that way!"

Nabiki stared at him for a few moments before giving an emphatic response.

"_No_." She frowned. "Really, that's a ridiculous idea. Do you want to get me killed?"

"Aww, come on! It'll be fun!"

"Maybe next time," She said as she opened her car door and stepped out into the rain. "We've got to hurry. They'll be here to inspect the car soon."

"Tch. Fine, whatever," He said as he followed her through his own door. The two ran across the road to their right, then climbed over the railing that divided the freeway, and continued running across six more empty lanes and finally stopping at the edge railing. There was at least thirty feet, or close to ten meters, between the edge of the freeway and the city wall. "Looks like you get to trust me anyway. We're gonna have to jump." He said with a grin, turning to look at her. Nabiki sighed and quickly looked around. She could see people from other cars watching them through their car windows, and the military cars could be seen approaching from far away.

"Okay already, hurry up. We're out of time already," She said. Kazuma grinned and activated his alter; a rainbow aura glowed around him and chunks of material from the pavement and railing were dematerialized before beginning to reform around his arm.

Nabiki looked around at the people watching from inside the cars, who started holding up something to the windows. She blinked at the strange things; she'd seen quite a few of them during her stay in the city – people had worn them on keychains and in plastic holsters. She'd seen some one talk into one on the bus and thought it might be a phone or something, but another person's had turned into something that resembled the computer they'd found in the clinic, but a much smaller version - keypad and everything. Now huge numbers of them were being pointed in her direction for reasons she could only guess. Maybe they had cameras?

It was at that moment that Nabiki felt more old fashioned and out-dated than she ever had in her life, and it frustrated her.

'_Well, it is the future after all. They're bound to have a bunch of things I don't know about.' _

"_Halt!_" A woman yelled at them through a megaphone. Both Kazuma and Nabiki turned to see a military vehicle slowly driving towards them – a few armored men were riding on top, with guns aimed at them. Kazuma's arm finished forming and the alter user quickly looked around, thinking. When his gaze fell on Nabiki, an idea came to mind, and he grinned.

Nabiki was only slightly surprised when the man suddenly grabbed her roughly, and gripped the top of her head with his metal hand.

"Stop right there, or I'll smash her damned head to pieces!" He yelled out as loud as he could.

The military vehicle simply continued on.

"_P-please!_" Nabiki yelled out. Kazuma got up on the railing, pulling her up with him roughly.

"I guess you don't care about your citizens, eh?" Kazuma muttered to himself.

Nabiki looked down over the edge of the railing and started screaming. Little did Kazuma know, it was not an act.

"Shut up, you stupid bitch!" He covered her mouth with his unarmored hand and looked around at the ground far below. The freeway was so high up that the cars on the ground below looked like little ants crawling in the dirt. He looked up at the military vehicle and was pleased to see that it had stopped.

"Heh. Good job!" With that, he crouched down low and punched the railing. The railing itself was obliterated, but the force exerted was enough to send Kazuma and his now screaming passenger sailing over the thirty feet to the edge of the city. He landed right on top of the wall and grinned. The soldiers still weren't shooting, afraid they'd hit his hostage, and he took that moment to jump down the side of the wall and slide down, using the claws in his metal hand to slow their descent down greatly. Nabiki's screaming had quieted now, but she was still breathing rather hard.

"You could have warned me, you idiot!" She yelled.

All he did was laugh.

From where they were, they could see the bridge that lead from the city exit. Somewhere below a cliff, Kimishima's car was still parked. Nabiki sighed in relief when she saw it; that it hadn't been stolen was a _miracle_ considering the conditions outside the city. She raised an arm and pointed over towards it.

"Kimishima's car. We need it now. He shouldn't have any problems getting out of the city; we've got HOLY coming after us by now. He'll understand."

"Got it," The alter user said, seeing the car. "Hey nice, closed top. No more rain!" He pulled his clawed hand from the wall, and before gravity could even take better hold, punched the wall, sending them flying towards the car. They fell short, but he punched the ground just before they landed, bouncing back up into the air several times before stopping close to the car. As they walked up to it, a group of men and women suddenly burst out of hiding behind it.

"So you guys must be the owners of this thing, huh?" A man with a spiky green mohawk grinned at them. "We'd have taken it earlier, but we figured you guys must be carrying quite a bit of money, eh? So yeah, if you want to live, hand over the money and the keys to this baby, yeah? Or we'll just kill you and take it ourselves."

"We don't have time for this," Kazuma growled as he held up his metal fist. The apparent leader sneered at them and a rainbow glow enveloped his body.

"Heh, good, then I'll make it quick!" Chunks of the ground started forming into something, but Kazuma wasted no time in responding.

"_Shocking First Bullet!_" One of the clips on his back burned away, and a green energy propelled his fist straight into the man's face, sending him flying backwards in a spin.

"Boss!" One of the other thugs tried to catch him, but he slammed into her with such force that she was dragged away. Nabiki took the time to hop into the car and pull a set of keys from her pocket. Before anyone else could react, they could hear the sound of some machinery in the distance, and they all turned to look at the city gates, which were opening. An APC made its way out of the city and Kazuma eyes widened.

"That's the HOLY thing that got us last night! Hurry up, get us out of here!" Kazuma said as he hopped into the car. The people all around the car scrambled away screaming as Nabiki. Almost immediately they were driving away at full speed.

"It's HOLY! Run for your lives!"

Nabiki guided the car around obstacles and drove over rubble and garbage as she drove towards one of the better preserved sections of what used to be Kanagawa. The city ruins would provide excellent cover for their escape.

"Kimishima must trust you more than I thought to give you keys to his car," Kazuma said with a grin as he watched the HOLY vehicle get smaller and smaller behind them. It didn't even seem to be pursuing them.

"He doesn't know I have one," She said, glancing in her rearview mirror. The HOLY vehicle couldn't be seen anymore, but it was still the safest bet to head through the city ruins.

"Ahh, I see—What!" He turned around and looked at her. "What the hell was that about him '_understanding_', earlier! He'll just think it was stolen!"

"He'll _understand_ when he gets to the clinic and sees his car in the front." She said with a smile. "And if not then, then when I talk to him about it. Okay?"

Kazuma took one look at her smiling face and decided it was okay. Nabiki smiling was never a good sign. Not that he'd tell her that.

"Ah... okay then…" He sat back in his chair and looked out at the city around them as they drove.

People crawled out from behind wreckage to look at them. The few people who were actually out and about in the rain paid them no heed, instead running with torn umbrellas or whatever they could find to keep themselves dry in the rain. A small child slipped in the water on some cracked pavement and fell.

As Kazuma looked out at them, a feeling of discontent rose up within him.

-スクライド-

Ranma and Kimishima were amongst a crowd in the street staring at a giant screen on a building on a street. When the rain had started, Ranma had given Ryouga to her companion and put on her cloak. There was a breaking news report, and a newscaster was talking about alter users breaking out of HOLD; the screen had subtitles to make up for the lack of sound. In a smaller picture in the corner, they could see Kazuma jumping off of a freeway with Nabiki in his arms.

"Those damned Revenus, they're going as far as kidnapping now?" A nearby man cried out angrily.

"Revenus?" Ranma blinked.

"That's what they call us in here," Kimishima whispered.

"Think they'll try to hold a ransom for her?" A couple of nearby teens were discussing the issue nearby.

"If they're smart, they'll let her go. There's no way they'd get away with ransom," one of the teens insisted.

"Revenus aren't smart, idiot."

"I wonder if they're gonna call in _Phantom_? Alter Users are part of Revenus, so…"

"I don't know… you know what they say, only Alter Users can fight Alter Users,"

Ranma looked around at all of the mutterings and talking going on around him and frowned.

"What the hell are they talking about?" She muttered.

"Us," Kimishima said with a chuckle. "Come on, we have to get out of here-" He stopped, spotting a building across the street that had some posters. One particular word jumped out at him. "New… Six-G… DoCoMo… Internet?" He narrowed his eyes. "Hmm… those are cell-phones, right?" He looked around, not quite sure where his companion was. "Hey, Ranma, you got a second?"

"What is it?"

"Something useful, I think…" Kimishima said, walking towards the building. Ranma shrugged and followed after him.

"You know we're in a hurry, right?"

"Yeah, but this is important."

"More important than escaping?"

"Something we'll have to come back for if we don't get it now."

"Oh…" The invisible redhead sighed. "Fine."

The two walked into the store, dripping wet.

"Welcome!" A girl standing by the door cried out immediately. The uniformed teen bowed to them in greeting.

"Er, hi… Um, I was wondering, um, those new things on the poster, those things-" He pointed at one of the phones on display. "They're on that new, uh, Six-G network, right?"

The girl giggled.

"You're new to this stuff, aren't you? But yes, that is correct. They can be put on a network, but you'll need purchase a service plan."

"I see… just wondering, er, what's so great about the 6G network again?"

"The most remarkable upgrade from 5G is that it works _anywhere_ in the world thanks to the relay satellites in orbit and new digital cell technology." She said with a smile.

"Is that so…" Kimishima asked with a growing smile.

-スクライド-

Scheris walked into the medical bay where Ryuho was being kept. She ignored the beeping devices and such by his side; the first thing she registered was a familiar black-haired woman wearing white clothes that signified her as one of HOLD's scientists sitting in a chair between him and the window.

"Mimori," the blue haired alter user started. The woman responded by looking up at her, and Scheris could see the tear-streaks on her face. A feeling of panic and unease gripped her when she saw the other woman's eyes. "H-How is he?"

"Ryuho is… he's…" There was a pause as the woman gathered her composure. "Many of his internal organs sustained serious damage, but… but they were able to save him from immediate danger."

The blue haired girl bit her lip.

"But?"

"They're unsure what long-term effects the damage will have on his body. For a person to survive this sort of trauma is extremely rare… it's almost as if he was hit by an automobile at full speed."

"I…I see…" The blue haired girl frowned as she looked over at the green haired teen. _'Ryuho…'_

"Adjani-san… thank you so much for finding him. If you hadn't abandoned your post to check on him, he might have died… I know it won't help, but I apologize for whatever trouble results from this…"

"A-ah… yeah…" the blue haired teen couldn't hold on to thoughts that concerned her blatant disregard for her orders earlier. All she could think about was the green haired teen in front of her. She walked over to the only other chair in the room and sat down.

-スクライド-

Kimishima looked at the spot where his car had been with a frown.

"I don't see your car anywhere," Ranma said.

"It's gone," Kimishima said with a sigh. "I'll have to get a new one again…"

"Well… if we keep making money, it should be easy," the redhead responded, patting him on the back.

"Yeah, but that thing really set me back… And now I have to _walk_ all the way home!" The man fell to his knees and slammed a fist into the mud. "It's not fair, damn it!"

"Eh…" Ranma sighed as she realized that an unfit guy like Kimishima would take hours to get home. In that time, he could be attacked or mugged – maybe even killed. Just for his clothes, if not any money he might happen to be carrying. And there were wild animals to think about too; a few times she'd seen half-eaten remains while walking Kanami to the farm. It was rather… unsettling to realize that the poor girl may have gotten _used_ to the sight of decaying human flesh.

With all of that in mind, Ranma realized that it would have left a bad feeling in her stomach if she left him all alone. "Look, I'll carry you to the clinic. How's that sound?"

"Huh? Carry?"

"Yeah, piggy-back or something. You can do that, right?"

The man looked at her, rather surprised.

"A-are you sure? Is that okay?"

"Yeah. Just… keep your damn hands off my boobs, okay?"

"Er… right."

-スクライド-

When Nabiki pulled the car in front of the clinic, it was still raining. Lightning flashed in the distance, and it was quickly followed by thunder. No lights were on in the clinic, which told them that they were probably out again.

'_Oh man, I never thought I'd be so glad to see this place again.'_ Kazuma thought, looking at the clinic from inside the car. "Man, with that heater on, it's all nice and toasty in here… I kinda don't wanna go in…"

"Isn't it?" Nabiki asked with a grin as she pulled the release on her chair and leaned back, relaxing. "But someone's waiting for you, isn't she?"

"Yeah, Kanami-chan…" He opened the door and got out of the car, then ran for the clinic.

"Hey! You could at least shut the door, damn it!" Nabiki called after him. He didn't seem to hear her as he banged on the door. "Idiot," she muttered, sitting up and pulling the door shut, then laying back again with a smile on her face. "Ah, things could be worse. I could be outside, walking home with nothing but the clothes on my back…"

Kazuma stopped banging on the door and instead tried to open it. It did so easily, and when he did, he could see Kanami. She looked like she'd been running to the door, and she was holding a candle.

"K-Kazu-kun!" The girl set the candle down on the nearby bench and started running towards him. He stepped in and blinked as she jumped up and hugged him.

"K-Kanami?" The brunette blinked again, confused by her behavior. "What're you…"

"Oh, Kazu-kun! I'm so glad you're back…" The girl started sobbing in his shirt and he frowned. "I thought I was never going to see you again!"

"Huh? Why would you think that?" He asked. The girl sniffed a few times as she tried to get herself together.

"W-well… I…I…" She stepped back and looked up at him. "I'm sorry… I was listening to Kimishima-san and Nabiki-oneesan talking… I heard… I heard that you'd been captured by HOLY…"

Kazuma froze. The younger girl looked up at him.

"Uh, er, there was a mistake, see," He said, smiling. "They mistook me for another Alter User that's been running around, and that's why they had to go get me, see…"

The little girl smiled at him, despite the tears on her face.

"It's okay Kazu-kun… You don't have to lie to me anymore."

"Huh? B-but… I'm not an alter user, Kanami," He said, frowning.

"You're… you're not?"

The teen shook his head.

"Nah. Though it sounds like it'd be awesome, being an alter user would be way too much trouble," He said with a grin.

"O-oh… I see…"

Kazuma blinked at the girl's voice. Why did she sound so disappointed?

"W-well, what about Ranma-chan? I heard she was caught too…"

"Oh, uh… He's fine. He's on his way with Kimishima right now. They had to walk back…"

"Oh… Well…" The girl pulled away from him and turned away. "I'll… I'll go start cooking dinner. They'll want to be warmed up when they get home…"

"Er… right." Kazuma blinked and scratched his head as he watched her walk away. _'Am I __**missing**__ something?'_

"Smooth one, Kazuma," Nabiki said from beside him. She closed an umbrella and shut the door behind her when he turned to look at her.

"Wait a minute… do you know what's going on here?" He asked suspiciously.

"Twenty-thousand yen," she said, holding up a hand expectantly. Kazuma's eyes bugged and she grinned. "No? Well then I guess you'll just go on not knowing the little girl's secret, hmm?" With that, she set the umbrella by the door and started walking towards the stairs. "I'll be in my room. When Kimishima gets here, send him to me."

Kazuma simply watched in silence as she walked away.

"I guess I'll have to start saving up…" He muttered when she was gone.

-スクライド-

"…ho… Ryuho… Ryuho…"

Ryuho awoke to the sound of his name. He opened his eyes and saw the familiar face of the woman who had been his friend seven years ago. Back before his mother had died at the hands of a native alter during an alter user attack on the city…

"Ku…Kuno-san?" The young alter user groaned and rubbed his eyes as he tried to sit up, but she held him down.

"You shouldn't move. Your body needs its rest right now," The young scientist said.

"Ah…" He couldn't feel any pain, but he knew that it was likely because of whatever drugs were running through his system, which were also making him feel rather lethargic.

"The commander's here to see you." Came another familiar voice. Ryuho looked to the side and saw Scheris; she was sitting on the other side of his bed. Behind her, at the door, stood Martin Zigmar.

"Commander, I assume there's a reason you came here… Am I going to be sent to the mainland?"

"No. Your performance up to this point has been adequate. The board considers you a valuable soldier. However…" The man looked at Scheris, as his announcement concerned her as well. "The National Defense Force has been called in to contain the Alter User threat."

"What?" Scheris was the first one to react, although Ryuho looked surprised as well. "But… but HOLY!"

"This is the second time Murasaji has been attacked by alter users in seven years," The commander said. "HOLY's efforts to capture and contain all of the Lost Ground's Alter Users have proven unsatisfactory to the mainland."

Scheris looked outraged.

"But-! This is ridiculous! Just because… What happened was a fluke! And it was nowhere _near_ as bad as last time!"

Ryuho looked at his bed. The last time an alter user had attacked Murasaji, his mother had been killed, triggering the awakening of his own alter ability.

"This really was a blunder on our part." The green haired youth started. "We allowed one Native Alter to escape us last night, and at least three, including the one who escaped last night, successfully infiltrated our headquarters. All of them escaped. There's also any property damage they managed to leave behind. And it's not just this particular incident. They've been wanting to send in the NDF for years." He looked out through the window at the darkening sky. "It's why the decision was made so quickly."

"But HOLY has been doing so well lately! We've captured what, two hundred alter criminals in this month alone?"

The commander sighed.

"Ryuho is right. This is just the excuse that they've been waiting for to come in. The Mainland… _Logos'_ council has been debating on the subject of how Murasaji is run since the last _Alter User_ attack."

"They don't seriously think that they'll be able to contain _all_ of the alter users, do they?" The bluenette demanded.

"Besides Satsuma, the NDF has been regulating Revenus outside of Murasaji for a while now. They likely have every confidence that they will be able to just walk in and do the same thing here." Mimori said.

"They're… they're completely underestimating the Alter Users…" Scheris realized. The commander nodded.

"That is why I do not doubt that things will only remain this way for a short time. However…If the system they implement is more effective, so be it."

Ryuho nodded.

"HOLD will probably be dismantled if it succeeds, with HOLY reforming to an NDF unit under new leadership and management." The commander nodded to that. "I assume the unit that will be leading the attempts to contain alter users is…"

The older man nodded again.

"Phantom."

There was some silence as everyone in the room considered that.

"Phantom? You mean… they'll be sending in those mechs? Heavy Warriors, even Gladiators?" Mimori had a horrified look on her face. "Those things are tools of war! Weapons of mass destruction! We should be helping these people, not carrying out their genocide!"

Scheris gave her a disgusted look.

"Even after seeing what one of them did to Ryuho, you still talk about helping them? They're _monsters!_"

"Scheris, you used to be a Revenus, did you not?" Ryuho asked. The blue haired girl opened her mouth, but he gave her a look, then sighed. "Kuno-san… Mimori is right. What we want to accomplish is justice, not a… massacre. And if the new hierarchy _dismantles_ HOLY…" He frowned and looked out the window again. "Where would you go then, when you are discharged?"

"I…" The blue haired girl shook her head. "I don't know…" Silence descended upon the room for a few moments.

"Well then, I'll excuse myself. I have work to get back to." The commander said, looking at Ryuho.

"I'm grateful for your coming to let us know about this development, sir." Ryuho said. The man nodded and left, and the green haired teen sighed. "Phantom, huh…"

The three teens mulled over the meaning of that announcement in their heads.

-スクライド-

When Ranma landed in front of the clinic, she threw P-chan at the door and set down her other passenger, taking care not to drop the box in her hands. After one incident where his hands had 'slipped', she'd pinched him on his thigh hard enough to make him scream like a girl.

His hands hadn't slipped again.

Of course, he never told her that it had totally been worth it.

She looked from the man to the car parked in front of the clinic and back with a sigh. The way he was staring at it, it was definitely familiar to him.

"That car yours?" She asked, wiping some rain from her face.

All he could do was nod mutely.

"I'm guessing Nabiki had something to do with this," She said as she started towards the clinic.

-スクライド-

'_That must been some sight… a girl carrying a pig and a box, with a full grown man riding on her back, through the rain no less._' Nabiki thought as she looked at a white box with a picture of some device, before looking up at her business partner, who was still shivering, despite having dried off and changed into some of the dry clothes left in the relief box. "Yeah… we barely managed to evade HOLY. Took us nearly twenty minutes just to lose them in the ruins. They seemed to be desperate to capture Kazuma. I can't imagine it reflects too kindly on them that he escaped."

"I-I-I S-s-seeee…" He stuttered. It did make sense after all. He'd seen them leaving on that screen. HOLD and HOLY would have definitely been after them when they made that jump.

"You should probably… definitely take a bath. Kazuma fixed the water heater earlier, so go on."

"R-r-right-t-t… Th-thank…" The man nodded stiffly and slowly turned around, his motions jerky.

"Uh, sure." She blinked. It was with no small amount of concern that she stood up, set the box of whatever they'd grabbed for her on her bed, before calling Ryouga and Ranma's names, then turned to face him. "You sit down here and let them help you," She said as she started towards the door.

Kimishima snickered in his head as he did so, but his outward appearance betrayed none of his mental state. The truth was, Ranma's Chi, which she used to keep herself warm, had had the nice side-effect of keeping him warm as well. Not that _she_ needed to know that…

-スクライド-

"He'll be fine, just needs to warm up. We filled up the bath and he's in there right now." Ranma said to Nabiki as they walked into their room. He'd managed to change back into a man and had changed his clothes to something much… drier.

"I see." The older teen nodded and then walked over to her bed, then plopped down on it.

"So, what's that thing he made me grab for you?"

"It's… a cell phone," She said.

Ranma blinked.

"A _phone_?" He blinked. It sure didn't _look_ like any phones he'd ever seen. He shook his head. _'Man, this is just too weird…'_

"Mmhmm." She opened the box and pulled the device out. To the both of them, the smooth and sleek design looked like something out of a sci-fi movie. "I was reading the manual. Normally, you'd need some activate some kind of service plan to actually use it, but…" The girl closed her eyes. "I think I can figure out a way to use this."

Ranma blinked.

"Huh?"

Nabiki's body was covered with a rainbow haze and Ranma's eyes widened.

"W-what?"

"Oh, calm down." She opened her eyes and looked down at the phone. The screen, which happened to make up ninety percent of the front face, flashed some brand name logos and the like. "Hmm, it probably doesn't have a phone number already…"

Ranma stared at her incredulously as she looked down at her new cell phone.

"N-Nabiki… you're…?"

"An Alter User, yes. Remember that Alter Forest Kazuma was talking about?" She said, looking up at him. "No? Well, there's a forest that grants alter users alter power, if…"

Ranma blinked.

"If?"

"The rest will cost you ten thousand," She said, looking back down at the phone with a smile.

Ranma rolled his eyes and shook his head.

"Should have seen that coming…"

"Yup." Nabiki said as the glow around her died. She started tapping the screen and smiled. "Looks like we're in business, too."

"Huh?" Ranma blinked. "Who are you gonna call with that, anyway?"

"No one, not right now," the older teen responded with a shake of her head. "I'd explain it to you, but you wouldn't understand. Here, read the book," She said, gesturing the book on her bed. There were pictures of the phone and smiling people doing various things with one on the cover. "Maybe, if you're a good boy, and you pay me, I'll let you play with it… under adult supervision, of course."

Ranma snorted.

"Pass," He said, turning around and walking out of the room. '_I'm really more interested in how you became an alter user than some stupid phone… and Kimishima said that stupid thing was important enough for us to steal, too! Then again, I guess… we didn't really have a phone in the first place…_' His face lit up as he realized something. '_Akane! I can call Akane! And pops, and mom!_' He instantly turned back around and ran back into the room, but Nabiki held up a hand without looking up from her device.

"We're going to have to find out if they're even still alive before we can drop a message, silly. And you should think long and hard about what you're going to say if they are. You don't seem to realize yet, but you will not be getting your old life back, Saotome."

Ranma's enthusiasm faded away almost entirely, but some of it came back almost immediately.

"I know they're still alive… we just have to find them." He said. "And I know I'll find a way back."

Nabiki sighed.

"Go eat something. Relax. We all deserve a break after today and last night."

Ranma blinked and looked at her.

"Technically, you're something of an employee of mine right now. Now seriously, go, so I can stop worrying about whether or not you'll be ready for a job tomorrow, or whenever we find new work."

Ranma rolled his eyes.

"I thought we were business partners?"

"Don't bother thinking about the semantics. Leave that to me." She said with a wink.

Ranma shook his head and turned around to leave the room again, leaving Nabiki to herself.

"Let's see if I can figure this Internet out…" Some explorative 'button' tapping had brought up a page with some text and fancy looking buttons. There were some suggestions on the main page. "Yes, this is my first time," She said, tapping one of the lines with a finger.

-スクライド-

Kazuma lay in his bed and stared up at the ceiling. Images of that green haired bastard and his smug face came to mind several times and he frowned. First, he had lost to the bastard, and then he had been flat out refused for a request for an honest rematch.

Kazuma hadn't really lost any fights before. It was the only thing he was good at, so he had to be the best. That was his determination…

But the green haired man… Ryuho, had walked all over his determination. The next time he saw the asshole, he had to run away because the situation was too much. And in all of that time, the smug bastard had been looking down at him, despite the respect he seemed to have for Ranma and, especially, Ryouga…

The Alter User reached up towards the ceiling with his right hand and clenched his fist.

"I'll… kick your ass someday…"

-スクライド-

The morning came faster than anyone wanted it to. Kimishima, having spent the night, was doing much better. Though everyone seemed bright and cheery – even Nabiki – their moods all held a tense undertone. After breakfast, Ranma and Kazuma walked Kanami to the farm and then returned to the clinic, where Nabiki gathered them together at the table to talk.

"Yesterday changed a few things and managed to put some dents in our plans." Nabiki started. Kimishima nodded.

"HOLY knows about us." He said. "They'll be actively looking for us now. At least, you three." He said, pointing at Ranma, Ryouga, and Kazuma. "I would say we should lay-low for a little while. Definitely avoid going near the city at all."

"What do you mean, us three," Ranma said. "What about her?" He pointed at Nabiki as he said that.

"Ah, yes…" Kimishima sighed and shook his head. "Well, she got this bright idea to go get an alter power, thinking whatever manifested in her'd be useful in saving you guys."

"And it's proven very useful." Nabiki said with a pleasant smile.

"How so?" Ryouga asked with a small frown. Ranma had introduced the concept to him the night before… "What is your alter ability?"

"I can do stuff." She said, not letting up her smile at all.

"Oh is that so." Ryouga rolled his eyes, reaching into his pocket. "How much?"

"One hundred million." Nabiki said, holding out her hand. Her smile had grown wider.

Ryouga frowned, pulling an empty hand from his pocket.

"You _could_ just say 'I don't want to tell you', you know," He muttered.

Kazuma grinned.

"She got some car we stole to work yesterday," He said.

"And she used it when she turned that phone on…" Ranma added with a thoughtful look.

"Probably has something to do with electronics," Ryoga said with a shrug.

Nabiki just kept smiling.

"Oh well, whatever."

The mercenary looked the four of them over.

"Now then. Thanks to that phone, I've been able to learn quite a bit. And it looks like I'm going to be learning even more soon," She said with a grin.

"Like what?" Ranma asked.

"Nothing too important," Nabiki said with a wave of the hand. "Just menial, but interesting stuff." She looked over at Kimishima, and then each of the others, finally letting her smile go. "Well then, I suppose that you guys can go to the farm. You won't be doing any work with us for a little while. We'll be looking into HOLY while you guys work the farm. When things look safe enough, we'll make sure to find you some work."

"…W-what?" Kazuma asked.

"Well, you have to keep yourself fed, don't you?" Nabiki asked. "I've got some savings that will keep me going for now, but…"

Kazuma frowned.

"B-but…"

"Aww, Kanami-chan's gonna be so surprised to see you there, huh, ain't she, bob-head?" Kazuma glared at Ranma for a moment, but it turned into a nasty smile.

"You forgetting something?"

Ranma frowned when he realized what the other boy was talking about, but it quickly turned back into a triumphant smirk.

"This might be the best time to introduce 'Big Bro' huh?"

"And his allergies to water," Ryoga said with a snort.

Ranma rolled his eyes.

"You manage to stay dry often enough, don't you?"

"Not all of the time…" Ryoga shook his head. "Yours would be harder to hide. I… have a tendency for losing my way, and they just assume that I'm…" The bandana-clad teen grumbled something under his breath.

Ranma looked from him to the table and made a 'Hmm' sound.

"You know, maybe we can just spend some time here, relaxing or something," Ranma said. "Yesterday was pretty tough, after all!"

"I second that motion." Kazuma said, raising a hand. Ryouga snorted again.

"Hmph."

"Then it's settled," Kazuma said with a grin. He looked over at Ranma. "I seem to recall you promised me a fight in place of pork-bun over there?" Ranma snickered while Ryouga growled. "You know, I wouldn't mind having a free for all," The alter user said.

"I'll see you outside then," Ryouga said, standing up. Ranma and Kazuma quickly got up as well.

"Why don't you let us lead the way," The martial artist said with a grin. They walked away, leaving the other two alone. Kimishima looked over at Nabiki, who was doing something with her new phone.

"They're this hot-headed right after breaking out of jail?" Kimishima shook his head. "Well, I'll be on my way."

"Right," She said. "When are you going to be back?"

"Probably thursday, maybe tomorrow," The man said.

"Right. See you then."

-スクライド-

Ranma looked over at Kazuma and Ryouga, who were walking in the general same direction as he was, across the ruined terrain of the city.

"So how do you guys wanna do this?" Kazuma asked, a big grin set in his face as he held up his right arm and was enveloped in a rainbow haze. Molecules from a chunk of building nearby broke down before suddenly flying over towards the young alter user and coalescing on his arm, forming the familiar Shell Bullet as his hair changed in the way it always did. He clenched his metallic fist and then flexed each individual finger until they popped.

Ranma grinned as he stopped walking and took a lazy stance with his hands in his pockets.

"How about the same as last time? No rules or nothin' like that."

"Heh. Last man standing wins?"

Ranma nodded with a grin, and looked over at Ryouga.

"You missed out on last time, pork-butt. Don't think there'll be any interruptions this time, though."

Ryouga snorted as he stopped walking and finished his stretching, then smirked over at Ranma.

"I've been waiting for this day for weeks." In a blur, bandanas were flying towards Ranma at breakneck speeds. "I wouldn't let anything interrupt us if it tried!" The lost boy roared as he charged towards his longtime rival. Ranma hopped up over the bandanas and allowed them to pass underneath harmlessly.

"Geez, that wasn't nearly as dramatic as I was expecting," Ranma muttered as his opponent bore down on him.

"Don't think you guys can get this party started without me!" Kazuma held out his fist. "_**Shocking First Bullet!**_"

With a burst of energy, the alter user exploded forward towards Ranma and Ryouga seconds before the two martial artists met. Both saw him and jumped out of the way, leaving him to slam his fist into the pavement. The collision between his fist and the pave resulted in a visible shockwave and a deep, wide crater formed from the punch. Seeing his attack having been ineffective, Kazuma quickly punched the ground, leaving a smaller crater in the first one and sending himself flying towards the pigtailed youth.

Ranma landed in time for the alter user to land beside him. He ducked under a punch and flipped over a kick, then quickly grabbed the alter user's left arm and leapt up over his opponent, flipping forward and slamming the heel of his foot into the back of the other teen's head. Kazuma rolled forward from the hit and Ranma landed in time for Ryouga to jump in with a kick. The pigtailed teen tried to twist his body around it, but the angle that he'd landed didn't allow him to get out of the way. The fanged martial artist's foot collided with Ranma's shoulder, and at the last second, Ranma tried to grab his opponent's leg, but he missed and was sent flying by the attack.

'_Man, you really don't get much time to strategize with both of them coming after you like that,_' Ranma thought with a grin as he righted himself in the air.

-スクライド-

Later that night, Nabiki was talking to Ranma and Ryouga before they went to sleep.

"Time for a little history lesson. Nothing on our families yet, but I've learned some more about about the current state of the world."

"Oh? Like what?" Ryouga asked.

"For starters, there was a war between Japan and the rest of Asia." She said. The other two looked surprised, but she continued. "We won. Apparently, Japan had started developing something called… 'Power-Assist' Technology right around the time we left, maybe a year or two after that. This stuff's no joke, either. It lets ordinary people perform incredibly hard and heavy-duty tasks. The newest form comes in a skin-tight suit and increases the average person's physical output to the point where he can lift at least a metric ton under one G. Horribly expensive, but all the construction companies and mainland military have it. And then they invented some kind of miniature gundam with four arms," She said.

"Gundams?" Ranma asked.

"Well, they're called Gladiators. They barely resemble Gundams, really… anyway, that's not important. It's thanks to this stuff that we won the war, and made some kind of equal-peace treaty with the Asian Union."

"…I see," Ryouga said with a frown. "What came of that?"

"Pretty much what we already know. Walled up cities strewn about, poverty outside the cities is a given."

"What do these… _Gladiators_ do now? Are they inactive?" Ryouga asked, frowning.

"No… They're used to settle domestic disputes now. They and the rest of the military, the National Defense Force, are used to... _quell_ civil unrest outside and inside the cities. Sometimes, you get some Revenus breaking into a city and causing nasty trouble, like holding people hostage and demanding food and supplies. Phantom, the organization within the military that uses the Gladiators, responds to these attacks with deadly force."

Ranma and Ryouga frowned.

"Revenus… that's what they call people living outside the cities, right?" Ranma asked.

She nodded.

"They pretty much treat them… us, I guess you could say, like a different species. According to that free encyclopedia website I looked at, some parts of the government are trying to integrate Revenus into Logos, but with mixed results. Only one city has done it successfully; everywhere else you get huge ranges of problems. I checked out a discussion site that it linked to… Ni-Channel, or something, and apparently there're groups of people who think that it's all lies, and the government isn't really doing much. A minority, to be sure, but the doubt is there."

The two boys took in that information and frowned. Some of the exact details, like the bit about a 'discussion site' went over Ranma's head, but both teens got the gist of her message.

'_Man… what has the world come to?'_ Ranma shook his head, feeling rather disgusted.

"Hmm," Ryouga said. "You say I can use that if I read the book?"

"The phone? And pay me, yeah. And stay where I can see you, too. Sure, why not."

Ranma frowned at her and mumbled under his breath.

"…Not like you paid for it…"

Nabiki looked down at him with a pleasant smile.

"Hmm? You say something, Ranma?"

"Nah, not really." The teen said, standing up. "I'm gonna go get some fresh air before I go to sleep."

"Get the light on your way out," Ryouga said, laying down under his futon and pulling his blanket up.

"Right," Ranma said as he did just that and continued on his way out.

-スクライド-

Ranma blinked when he noticed Kanami sitting on a rock. She turned and looked back at him, then smiled.

"Couldn't dream, Ranma-chan?"

The pig-tailed teen shook his head and chuckled.

"Well, I got worked up thinking about something stupid, so I think I'll try to calm myself down with another kata. What's wrong with you, can't sleep either?"

"Ah… my dream…" She looked up at the starry night sky. "The past two nights, my dreams were… Sad and defeated… there was a feeling of disappointment in myself. It made me want to cry…"

Ranma frowned, and began to say something, but the little girl continued.

"… But, I think tonight will be different..." She looked down at him with a smile. "Because Kazu-kun was smiling tonight."

Ranma blinked.

"Ah…"

-_**Gray Skies Part 5: End**_-


	6. Found

"Stupid tomboy," Ranma grumbled, as he rubbed a sore spot on his face as he walked down the stairs of the Tendo home, and started for the door.

"Oh, Ranma, did you two get into another argument?" Kasumi asked from a door in the hall with a half smile on her face. "I thought you'd worked out your differences already, after that last incident?"

"W-well, what can _I_ do if she wants me to try out her latest batch of nuclear chip cookies?" The pig-tailed teen said, flicking his hair to the back of his head. "I don't want to _die_, you know!" The older woman giggled and shook her head as she turned and walked away.

"You know she only cares about you, Ranma-kun."

"Well, she needs to find a _healthier_ way to express her _caring_." The young martial artist muttered as he opened the door. He heard her sigh in response.

"Dinner will be ready in ten minutes." She said as she went into the kitchen.

"Right, right, I'll just be right out here," He said, waving her off as he walked outside, shutting the door behind him. The moment he stepped outside, he blinked, looking around at the Tendo property. "W…what the hell?"

The whole yard was in ruin. The fence had been obliterated and lay in piles of broken wood, and the path stones were cracked and broken - indistinguishable from rocks; weeds grew everywhere, and the koi pond was just a small, scummy pit that had mostly dried up and filled in by dirt over time. Thanks to the fence being gone, he could see the whole neighborhood; houses were destroyed, streets lay in rubble, and wrecked, old rusting cars with faded paint, missing wheels and broken windows sat with more weeds growing around and in them.

"What's…going on here?" Ranma demanded. Panic suddenly gripped him and he turned around to look at the Tendo Dojo. He slowly backed away from what he saw.

It was in ruins, worse than he'd ever seen it before. The whole house had collapsed, leaving nothing more than a pile of rubble. Walls, glass, and bits of the roof were strewn about here and there. More weeds.

The front door fell down, landing at his feet. Ranma looked up from the door to the house.

"Akane… Akane!" He immediately ran forward and pushed his way through the wreckage, looking, searching. "Kasumi! I was just talking to Kasumi! I was just talking to Kasumi _goddamn_ it!" The teen threw pieces of the dojo away as he searched frantically. "_I was just talking to Kasumi!_"

-スクライド-

Ranma jerked in his futon and sat up quickly, wide-eyed and panting. He looked around the dark room in a frenzy, slowly recognizing where he was. The teen quickly calmed down when he realized he was in the room he shared with Nabiki and Ryouga at Kazuma's house.

As strange as it seemed, this was reality.

He glanced up at the cheap wall-hung digital clock they'd bought from a man down the road. It read 02:44.

The teen blew a terse breath as he lay back down. It would be a while before he went back to sleep.

-スクライド-

Disclaimer: None of the series, characters, or locations mentioned in this story are owned by the author of this story unless stated otherwise.

**GRAY SKIES**

- Chapter 6: Found –

-スクライド-

Ranma blinked as he looked across the table at the man who supplied them with the only jobs that were keeping them afloat in the twenty first century. Kanami had gone to the farm already, and light was shining in through one of the kitchen's windows on his face.

"Underground fighting tournament?"

"It pays well," Kimishima started with a grin. "Really well."

"This sounds like my kind of work," Kazuma said with a huge grin, leaning back in his chair. "Fighting for the sake of fighting, instead of trying to make a point from one corrupt, rich bastard to another? I'm in! So in!"

"It's not that simple," Nabiki said, looking up from her phone at the younger teen.

The alter user frowned at her.

"The hell do you mean? 'Course it's that simple! A fight is a fight!" he sighed and shook his head. "I just worry about the competition. If it's not too challenging, then I'll get bored…"

"And so will the crowd. Which is why I say it's not that simple."

Kazuma blinked and looked at her.

"I would listen to her," Ranma said, pointing at the older teen. "She's got tons of experience with this stuff."

"Hm. Thank you for the endorsement, Ranma-kun," Nabiki said.

"We're even now, right?"

"Mmm. Not yet."

The pig-tailed teen cursed and everyone else rolled their eyes.

"Now, Kazuma-kun," she said, smiling at the brown haired teen, "Exactly who do you think is running those fights?"

The young man blinked.

"Well, of course, one of those bastards Kimishima's friends with, but…"

"And do you think those gentlemen are the sort who would be satisfied with making a little bit of money on any one fight?"

"Well of course not, they're all greedy bastards," the teen said with a sigh. "So, what, there's going to be fixed matches?"

"Very likely." Nabiki said with a nod. "Of course, that's not always the case, but it happens often enough that you might make someone upset the way you do things,"

"Then I just beat the shit out of them too, and take all of their damn money," Kazuma said, leaning back in his chair. "No big deal."

Nabiki and Kimishima sighed.

"That aside, a question remains. Whether or not we agree to participate in fixed fights depends on if we go at all," Ryouga said with a frown. "How far is it? What are we going to do with Kanami if we go?"

"Ahh… That's true," Kimishima said, scratching his chin. "It's way on the other side of the Lost Ground for the next two weeks... That'd be a hell of a drive every day."

"And we can't exactly take her with us," Ryouga said. "I won't deny that there's money to be made, but that would be a bad influence on her, don't you think?"

"Oh please," Kazuma said with a snort. "I know you guys grew up in a city or something, but come on. Have you ever taken a look around the Lost Ground? Kanami was by herself before I met her. She'll be fine going with us."

Ranma and Ryouga frowned at that.

"Listen, I spent just as much time wandering around outside of a city as I did in," Ranma said, crossing his arms. "I'm not some spoiled brat."

"And I definitely spent more time outside of cities," Ryouga said with a frown. "I was just trying to be considerate."

Kazuma opened his mouth to respond, but Nabiki beat him to it.

"Ah, I guess that makes me the only city brat in here! I hope you guys can take good care of me!" Everyone else rolled their eyes and she continued. "Back to the matter at hand, two weeks should be more than enough time for us to clean house…"

"Wouldn't it?" Kimishima asked excitedly. "Between you three, there's hardly anything that could slow us down! Rumors have already spread about the ballsy native alters who attacked and escaped from HOLY's headquarters in the city!"

"But I'm not an alter user," Ranma protested.

"Like it matters! It's a chance to make big money!"

"Hmm…" Nabiki frowned. "That's certainly true… but at the same time, HOLY's looking for us now."

"Well, are you that worried about them?" Kimishima asked, looking at her.

"Of course. Why shouldn't we be?" She asked, raising a brow.

"Hm, well," He grinned. "You knew what you were getting into, didn't you?"

The other four teens looked at her, and she frowned and looked away.

"Hmm. True enough."

There was a pause as the young Tendo thought for a moment. Kazuma looked around the table several times.

"Well?" He said after waiting almost two minutes. "We going or no?"

"Hey," Ranma blinked and turned to look at Kazuma. "If we take Kanami, won't she find out about your Alter?"

The alter user blinked at that.

"Oh, I guess you're right…" He frowned as he considered the issue. '_If she finds out that I'm an alter user…_' He shook his head. _'More than that, we'll be surrounded by alter users anyway…'_ He sighed and leaned back in his chair with a grin. "Well then, I guess we just can't take her!"

"So then what? If we leave her at the farm for _two weeks_, then… I mean, they might not want to give her back. With good reason," Ryouga said.

"That's something I'm wondering about."

Everyone turned to look at Nabiki and she continued.

"Really, should we keep her here at all? She goes to work there, gets a little bit of food and then sleeps over here. Why does she even bother staying here every day? There's probably more kids her age there, and it's a better overall environment for someone like her."

Everyone looked over at Kazuma.

"That's true, I've wondered about that too…" Kimishima said. He looked over at Kazuma. "I've known her as long as I've known you, really… and you do spend time with her… but…"

Kazuma shrugged and looked away and everyone was silent again.

"Sooo…" Everyone looked at Ranma and he stopped. "Um… yeah…"

"I think it's for the best if we _do_ leave her at the farm," Nabiki said. "It's better for her, and better for us."

Kazuma remained silent.

"But…" Ranma tilted his head. "I don't know, things… won't be the same without her… you know?"

"It's the safest bet," Ryouga said with a frown. "She can't be dragged into alter fights if she's not around alter users, right?"

"What?" Kazuma frowned and looked over at him. "You're _kidding_, right? In the Lost Ground, there _is_ no _safest bet_," He spat. "She'll be in danger of being attacked by alter users no matter where she goes. And not having anyone around to protect her would be the worst. I know none of those stupid _hicks_ can put up a good fight. They're all scared shitless of guys like me."

"With good reason, if you'll remember," Nabiki said, holding up a finger. "After all, unless you're like these two," she gestured Ranma and Ryouga, "There's really no way to fight against alter users without being one yourself."

"So why don't they get some friendly alter users?" Ranma asked. "I mean, there're a lot of people who live at the farm. One of them has to be an alter user, right?"

Kimishima shook his head.

"It's not that simple, I'm afraid. '_What if they turn on us?_' It'd be too easy for someone who was once a friend to suddenly become an oppressor and abuse their alter powers. They're reasonably afraid of what they can't fight. Any alter users there are probably hiding their powers to fit in." He explained.

"It's not that easy for people to change," Ranma snorted.

"Here in the Lost Ground, it's plenty easy. You should have learned that by now." Kazuma said with a scowl. Everyone looked over at him and saw that he was clenching his right fist and gritting his teeth. "My old man…" He shook his head. "No. We're taking Kanami with us." He said.

"So you've decided then," Nabiki said. "Good job. That's a marked improvement."

Kazuma blinked and looked over at her.

"Huh?"

"I've always thought you were a bit wishy-washy," She said offhandedly. "But anyway. How do you plan to tell her about your alter? And doesn't whether or not she comes, depend on if she wants to stay with you?"

Kazuma remained silent.

"Well… I hadn't considered that…"

"Hn. I'll let you handle it," Nabiki said.

"Then for now, as far as she knows, we're there to watch Ranma and Ryouga." Kimishima said. "Anything else?" When no one spoke up, he grinned and stood up. "Well then! I guess that means we're settled! Time to make some money!"

"Wait. When are we leaving?" Ranma asked.

"Right now, of course! The sooner the better!" The man in the green coat snickered as he walked through the door to the lobby, rubbing his hands together. "Heh heh heh, this is going to be great!"

Ranma, Ryouga, and Kazuma shared a surprised look, then started to react.

"I guess I'll go get Kanami." Kazuma said, standing up.

"Hm." Nabiki frowned and looked away. '_I don't dislike the girl, but she's a liability. Especially with Kazuma's attachment…_'

_**-**__**スクライド**__**-**_

Ryuhou sat, looking down at his hands as the HOLY Armored Personal Carrier he and a few others sat in made its way over the rough wild lands towards the location of the Alter User sighting. According to the reports, a dangerous, volatile alter user was continually harassing and attacking the people of the area. The green haired teen was suspicious of the report, though; according to his experience and the data he'd seen before accepting the mission, the area was full of nothing but gangs, many of which had alter users, so it was unlikely that any offended parties would have reported something like _that_ to HQ. It may have been an attempt to call HOLY out, as stupid as that was. Still…

"We're here." a familiar voice came from his side and he turned to see Tachibana, the purple haired youth whose alter, _Eternity Eight_, took the form of eight orbs that could be manipulated in a number of different ways.

"Are you sure you're feeling up to this?"

Ryuhou turned to look at the blue haired girl to his side. Scheris was looking at him with more than a bit of worry.

"I'll be fine," He responded as he stood up. He tried to ignore the pain in his gut, but he couldn't hide the pained expression on his face as he did so.

"You're not okay," She said, frowning at him. "You should stay here. Let me and Tachibana take care of this one."

"No," Ryuhou said. "That is unacceptable. I must… perform my duty." With that, the large door in the side of the vehicle slid open, revealing the ruined landscape of the Revenus' domain. There was the rubble of a skyscraper that looked like it had been demolished recently, in comparison to the buildings nearby covered in vines and other plant growth. Ryuhou stepped out of the vehicle and looked around. "You say this is where the chief was found?"

"Yes." Scheris said, stepping out behind him. "It seems that this area serves as a hide-out for several gangs, at least a few of which are suspected of harboring alter users," She said.

"Hm. Do you think one of those alter users could be causing the trouble here?" Tachibana asked.

"If that were the case, then I believe we would be openly challenged, as per usual." Ryuhou surveyed the landscape again. "But there are definitely signs of a recent alter battle…"

"You guys be careful." The three alter users turned around to see a HOLD soldier talking to them. "I heard that the native alters who escaped a few days ago have been sighted in this area frequently in the past."

Ryuhou looked up at the woman and nodded.

"Thank you for the notice." He said. The soldier nodded and ducked back into the vehicle, which then took off. His two comrades looked at him and he started walking towards one of the skyscrapers. "They'll be scouting the outer area. Let's see if we can't find anything in here."

Minutes later, the three teens were investigating the base of one of the few skyscrapers that still stood at its full height, albeit with vines growing and rubble lying about inside.

"There're no _Revenus_ here," Scheris said as she peered through the wreckage gathered around the base of the skyscraper. "There are signs that a few used to live out here, but they've all left for some reason."

"Hm." Ryuhou frowned and looked at the broken glass doors of the building before them. "And that is odd, considering the substantial amount of shelter a place like this could supply them with… must have something to do with the alter sighting." He walked towards the glass doors and peered inside the building to see if they could find anything or not. It seemed to be the lobby of what was once a department store. Inside, the wreckage was not as bad as the outside, considering the floors weren't cracked and destroyed, but everything was covered in dust and plant growth in the few spots of sunlight that shone in through holes in the walls.

In a moment, he could feel the sensation of being watched, and the alter user frowned as he sharpened his senses. He quickly turned to face a large pile of clothes that were sitting in the lobby. The teen pushed the two doors open, gaining the attention of his colleagues.

"Ryuhou? Did you find something?" Scheris called out to him. Ryuhou ignored her as he walked towards the pile of clothes, a rainbow glow forming around his body. Parts of the rubble inside changed, the molecular structure being altered by his ability to take the humanoid form that he had named Zetsuei.

Immediately he felt an unnatural chill in the air as he looked down at the pile of clothes. For an instant the clothes moved and the alter user froze, preparing to take action should something come out. Tachibana was now behind him, having walked in silently, ready to act with his own alter – eight neon-green glowing orbs – floating around him, ready to take any shape necessary. The two glanced at each other and shared a slight nod.

Ryuhou took a step towards the clothes and they moved again. The movement was jerky, as if something under it had shuddered. A breeze seemed to blow at them from the clothes, carrying with it the sound of a faint voice, barely audible.

"_L…Leave…_"

The two HOLY members looked at each other, both sure they'd heard that.

"Did you guys hear that?" Scheris called out to them from the exit.

The two looked at her and nodded. Tachibana looked out towards the clothes and took a step forward.

"Is someone there?" The purple haired youth called out. There was no response. He took a step towards the pile again. "If you can hear me, please come out. We mean you no harm…"

Another light wind came from the clothes.

"_Leave me alone…_"

"Please, if you would just come out," The youth said again.

This time, there was no blast of wind, but a voice clearly audible.

"Go away."

Ryuhou frowned. That had been the voice of a young girl.

"We're not here to hurt you," The green haired youth said, taking a step forward.

"Go away! Leave Naomi alone!" The two felt a blast of wind and Ryuhou frowned. "Go! _Go away!_" The voice was starting to sound hysterical, and the air temperature dropped again. Instantly Zetsuei was moving, ribbons flowing out and creating a protective cocoon around the two alter users in the building. Inside the cocoon of ribbons, Tachibana's Eternity Eight provided enough light to see, and the two were treated to the sight of the ribbons frosting over, protecting them from the brunt of whatever was going on outside. Ryuhou closed his right eye and the image of the world outside came to him from Zetsuei.

Outside, the entire interior of the mall had been frozen over; the protective cocoon as well as the walls and floors of the building were covered in ice. The pile of clothes had been scattered around the room, as if the blast of wind had originated from within it, and lying in a fetal position was a small figure.

"How are we?" Tachibana asked, looking at Ryuhou.

"Her alter seems to have control over temperature. The entire lobby was frozen over in an instant."

Zetsuei turned its head to look over at the exit, where Scheris was peeking her into the building.

"Scheris is safe."

The alter retracted its ribbons and Ryuhou opened his eye again. Before anything could be said, they could hear the sound of someone crying nearby. They all looked over at the small child lying in the middle of where the clothes had been. She was wearing torn, dirty rags, her skin was pale, and her hair white.

Ryuhou slowly approached her, and sensing no more alter energy, the teen felt brave enough to approach get close. He knelt down over the child and looked at her.

"Naomi," he started, "Is that your name? Naomi?"

The girl opened her red eyes at him for a moment, and the terror he saw in her face struck at him like a physical blow.

"P-please… don't hurt me…"

He grimaced.

"I'm not going to hurt you. We're here to help you." He could hear Scheris talking into her radio in the background. Soon the HOLD unit that had brought them would be back, ready for transport. "My name is Ryuhou Tairen. I am an officer of HOLY and I am here to make sure you get the help you need to learn how to control your alter powers."

The words he spoke seemed to have an effect. Her crying became subdued and she looked up at him.

He smiled down at her. "You're safe now."

_**-**__**スクライド**__**-**_

Kazuma walked along the dirt road with Kanami by his side.

"You've been pretty quiet today, Kazu-kun," The young girl said, looking up at him. "Is something on your mind?"

"Er, we're going on a trip," He blurted out.

Kanami stared at him for a moment.

"A trip?" They both stopped in front of the clinic. "Where are we going?"

"Ranma and Ryouga were invited to some fighting tournament," Kazuma said with a grin. "We get to watch them fight."

"Huh? But that hardly seems useful…"

"They'll be making lots of money," Kazuma said, winking at her. "And we don't have to work at all!"

Kanami frowned.

"But that's… dirty money, isn't it?" She asked. Kazuma blinked. "It's good to have money and all, but… I think it's better to earn it honestly…"

Kazuma chuckled.

"What are you talking about? Ranma and Ryouga are good guys. If they don't go, then only bad guys will be getting the money anyway. If it's there, shouldn't we take it, and use put it to good use?"

She blinked. It was a surprisingly logical argument, coming from Kazuma.

'_But he probably just wants to see them fight…'_ she thought, frowning. "I guess…"

He grinned again.

"Good! Now go on, get packed. This is gonna be a two-week trip!"

"Two weeks?" She asked, her eyes widening.

"Yep! Aren't you excited? We've never done anything like this before. It'll be fun!" He turned and started walking out the door.

She blinked and then shrugged.

"Well, that's true… Hmm…" She smiled and started walking towards the stairs. "I'll have to let them know at the farm…"

_**-**__**スクライド**__**-**_

Ryuhou sat waiting in HOLD's private hospital's lobby. The young girl they'd found several hours before had been identified via DNA fingerprinting. To do so was standard procedure for anyone brought in from Revenus; even though it was a rare occasion that the person would turn out to be someone who had once been Logos and their DNA would be on record, it was still possible and had served to identify many missing people in the past.

In this case, it turned out that she had been the daughter of two prominent doctors; a chiropractor and a cardiac surgeon – both of whom had died in an accident out in Revenus four years ago in a failed Revenus Aid campaign. Everyone had assumed that the girl, Naomi, had died as well, but apparently that was not the case. Her unique appearance was hard to mistake for anyone else, anyway – as an albino, she had extremely rare features and nothing short of a clone would have matched them.

"Ryuhou." The green haired teen looked up to see Scheris standing at the entrance to the lobby. "That poor girl, she's had it so rough."

Ryuhou nodded. Alter Users weren't treated very well on either side of the wall. He couldn't begin to imagine what sort of trauma the girl had endured for the past four years. She was no older than thirteen.

"At least she's got surviving family," He said. "Her grandfather is flying in at this very moment." He let his gaze drift away from her. 'I can only imagine his reaction at finding out that she was still alive.'

"Yeah." The bluenette nodded. "I don't know, though. She's… going to need some help, really."

"That's exactly what family is for," Ryuhou said, looking down at the ground.

"Yeah…" Scheris sighed with a bit of nostalgia as she walked over to sit next to him. "Cases like these are the worst."

He gave a non-committal grunt in response and stood up.

"I have… other duties to attend to. Keep me posted." He said, turning and walking towards the exit. _'They say that alter users are monsters, but… what kind of people would she have had to have been around to become like that?'_ He shook his head as he made his way into the hall outside the lobby. _'Are Revenus truly no better than animals?'_ He glanced over his shoulder at the lobby. _'No. Scheris… and that girl, Ranma. They're sensible people, even if one of them is extremely reckless.'_ He thought. _'I can't imagine why Ranma would want to stay out there. It's true that HOLY detains all native alter users as soon as possible, but it __**is**__ for their own safety, and that of those around them, like with this girl…'_

He looked up at the ceiling and sighed.

_**-**__**スクライド**__**-**_

Ranma looked out into the distance through the open car window as they drove through the wilderness. The sun was over the distant horizon, bathing the dark rain clouds above in a reddish glow. Though one storm had just passed, another one was on its way, but until then it would be nice and warm. The four of them – Ryouga, Ranma, Kazuma, and Kanami were stuffed into the back of Kimishima's car, and the driver was as reckless as ever.

For the fourth time that day, the car, with six passengers and most of their scarce possessions experienced the freedom of flight as the driver took it over an impromptu ramp. The four in the back braced themselves, and in instants the car landed on the dirt, jostling everything inside about. The two in the front seemed hardly affected by the jump at all.

"Haha! That was great!" Kimishima was smiling like a loon, unaware of the suffering of those in the back of his car.

"Kimishima, stop that!" Kazuma shouted. "You're gonna hurt Kanami doing that crazy shit!"

"Oh, relax, she's _fine_," Kimishima said.

"I'm okay, Kazu-kun," Kanami said, looking up at him with a smile.

It was clearly a lie though - she was squished between him and Ryouga, which was already bad enough, and looked a bit ill.

"I mean it, Kimishima." The alter user said.

"Oh, _come on_, quit whining back there, grandma." The driver said.

"What'd you just call me, punk?" Kazuma demanded.

Ranma glanced at the two's antics, then turned to watch the oncoming scenery. A dark highway road became visible in the distance ahead, and Kimishima turned onto it to follow it the rest of the distance to their destination. The cracks in the road were numerous, and huge puddles could be seen scattered about. Ranma quickly put up the window as they came upon one huge puddle and was rewarded with the sight of water splashing up from the ground across the window. He looked around and could see that everyone else had done the same.

"Sooo, exactly what are we going to do there besides mess around with some thugs?" The pig-tailed teen asked, bored with the silence. "Any sight-seeing?"

"Not much. I'll be looking into some things of course, but you boys can just do whatever you want. As long as it isn't stupid of course," Nabiki said. "I know that you guys won't just ignore some things when they're right in front of you, but try to think of our situation when you go off getting involved in stuff."

"Hmph," Ryouga shrugged and Ranma simply turned to look back out the window.

_**-**__**スクライド**__**-**_

From behind a thick glass window, an aged and grayed Tofu Ono looked down at the white haired child laying on a medical bed. Her eyes were closed and she was covered with a hospital gown. Several electrodes and wires were attached to her head, chest, and limbs. A single tear made its way down the man's face at the sight before him. Against all odds, his oldest daughter's only child lay on the bed before him, alive.

The door to his left opened, but he ignored it.

"You've arrived faster than we expected."

The once simple chiropractor and family doctor finally turned to see three men standing beside him, and frowned through his glasses. Two of them were dressed in white and purple uniforms; one was tall, had long hair and was in his thirties, and the other one had green hair and looked to be no more than a teenager. The other was a doctor, given away by his white coat, and likely the head physician.

"Of course. I used my private jet." The aged man said. "News like this… news like this doesn't come more than once in a lifetime." The two older men nodded, while the younger teen looked slightly nervous. "Tell me about her. What do you know so far?" Tofu asked, turning to look at his granddaughter.

"She's surprisingly healthy, considering the situation that she was found in. That said, she's had some slight physical trauma, is suffering from malnutrition, which has stunted her physical development, and has a stomach infection, which we are treating her for. She was fairly dehydrated before being brought in, as well."

"Diarrhea…" Tofu muttered.

The other doctor nodded.

"Nice guess. Anyway, she's not in any immediate danger. Proper diet and medication will put her back on her feet in no time. The physical injuries are light, some bruises and a sprained ankle, but nothing serious." The doctor said with a shrug.

Tofu grunted, his frown growing worse.

"What about her mental condition?" He asked, looking at the doctor again.

"Well… It's still early but… she seems to have had an… unpleasant experience," The doctor started.

Tofu rolled his eyes at the younger doctor's statement.

'_How unprofessional,'_ He frowned at the younger man's statement. "Can you give me anything more than that?"

"Unfortunately, no." The doctor said. "She's been asleep for the most part since she got back."

"You mean sedated." Tofu said with a frown, looking at the two men with uniforms. "I assume this has something to do with these two soldiers?"

The tall man with long hair nodded.

"Mister Ono," The man started. "Simply put…"

"Naomi is an alter user?" Tofu said, glancing at the girl on the bed. He looked back at the men.

"You knew?" The younger one asked.

"I recognize your uniforms, and I can't think of any other reason for HOLY to be involved." Tofu said with a frown.

"I see." The older man nodded. "Then you should understand that, as a citizen of Murasaji Special Economic District, your granddaughter will have to be specially educated in one of HOLY's private facilities?"

There was a pause and Tofu looked over at his granddaughter before the man continued.

"At the very least, she'll have to learn how to control her alter power." The man said. "And there's no reason for her to not use that power to support HOLY when she's gained control over it."

"Have you no concept of subtlety?" Tofu demanded, looking over at the man. "I don't want her to be a soldier," The aged martial artist spat. "She's a child! She's already been through so much!"

The green haired teen glanced up at his superior and raised an eyebrow.

"Yes, we understand your feelings on the matter, Mister Ono, and will respect your wishes, but it is my duty to inform you of the possibility. Aside from that," The man said, "I wanted to let you know that it was Ryuhou here who found your daughter, and he was the only one to directly speak with her."

"What?" Tofu asked.

The other doctor coughed.

"She wouldn't open her mouth after she was brought in," He said. "She got… _nervous_… and started to use her Alter power, so…" He gestured out towards the bed she was lying on.

Tofu frowned. He hadn't liked the way the man said "nervous", but they were treating her like a wild animal. He sighed and shook his head, then looked over at the teenager, Ryuhou.

"She spoke to you, young man?" He asked.

The boy nodded.

"Yes, sir."

"What did she say?" The man asked.

"Sir…" The boy hid his nervousness well – it was only because of Tofu's trained eye as both a physician and martial artist that he could see it. "…She asked us to leave her alone, and then started crying. That's all."

The wrinkles in the aged chiropractor's face creased even more.

"I see." He turned to look at his granddaughter.

Silence reigned.

"Well then," The long haired soldier said after a long moment, "Ryuhou and I have other duties to attend to. If you will excuse us," The man said with a slight nod as he and his subordinate made their way out.

"Ah yeah, that's right, tonight's… I should get ready for more patients," The other doctor muttered, quickly making his way out of the room.

Tofu simply stood in silence and watched the girl on the bed infront of him, the steady rise and fall of her chest indicating that she was indeed alive. That was still the hardest thing for him to believe.

_**-**__**スクライド**__**-**_

Kazuma whistled as they pulled up to what appeared to be a junk heap and the driver killed the engine. The sun was setting off in the distance behind the mountains of scrap, and the clouds were further south of them now. As soon as Kimishima opened the door there was a cool breeze and the warm air was sucked out.

"This the place?" He asked as Ranma, Ryouga, and Nabiki each opened their own doors to join the car's owner.

"Yep, it is."

"What? You can't be serious," Ranma said, frowning at the junk heap. "What kind of place is this? I thought there'd be… I dunno, some kind of _building _or something," He said.

"When I said underground, I meant _underground_," Kimishima said with a snort. "You don't think such a fine establishment could get away with being in plain sight with HOLY and HOLD prowling about, now do you?"

"I see," Ryouga said with a frown.

Standing off to the side right before a particularly large mound of junk gate were two men with automatic guns slung around their necks. Nabiki started walking over to them while Kimishima surveyed the area.

"This place is creepy," Kanami said as she hopped out of the car behind Ranma. "Why do they have guns?"

"Protection from alter users," Kazuma said. "Nobody gets that kind of help from the city out here, you know."

"Oh…" Kanami frowned and her posture seemed to wilt. "That's right, alter users… are bad…"

Ranma turned to look at her when he heard her tone of voice and frowned.

"You okay, kid?" He asked.

"Hm?" She looked up at him, then smiled. "Yeah."

"Huh." Ranma shrugged and looked over at Nabiki. The older teen was already on her way back.

"There's a separate facility for storing vehicles." She said as she got close to Kimishima. "Our rooms have been prepared. We'll take our stuff in right now," She said, "You can park the car in the garage." She pointed in another direction.

Kimishima nodded and got back in the car while Ranma and Ryouga walked over to the trunk and opened it, then dug out the thick cloth bags with their meager belongings inside.

"Come along now, children," Nabiki said with a grin, turning around. "Don't you want to see what our rooms are like?"

"Yeah. _Garbage Dump, Inn and Suites_. Can't wait." Ranma muttered as the five of them all walked towards the two men while Kimishima turned the car on.

_**-**__**スクライド**__**-**_

Nabiki impatiently tapped her foot as the elevator slowly hauled her group underground. The loud sound of heavy machinery could be heard echoing around them, and the light faded from dark blue to dark orange as they started passing old, poorly lit bulbs hanging from the walls in the elevator shaft, the dim light pouring in through the thick wire mesh walls of the elevator car. The walls went from being ratty, torn concrete to jagged, carved stone as they got deeper.

After several moments, the air started to get stale, and finally much of the shaft around them disappeared, revealing a view of what looked like a small underground city. The elevator slowed down to a stop and the doors opened. Nabiki immediately stepped out and looked around; they were on a catwalk high up in the city, which was replete with "streets" made up walkways similar to the one they were on, lit buildings with signs, and crowds. Wires and cables hung down from the ceiling high above them, some of them holding up the railings like the one they were on, and there were cavernous, rock walls around the perimeter.

The air was incredibly stale and smelled very heavily of cigarette smoke, and she nearly gagged.

"They must not get much circulation down here," She muttered, looking around. The buildings were all old and run down, not unlike the clinic they were staying in now, and all of the people were, in her opinion, poorly dressed. Women (and a few men, she noted with a cringe) wore skimpy miniskirts and tube-tops or the like that showed more of their slightly grotesque bodies than even she'd want to, and excessive makeup. There were many dingy, scruffy looking men, and gangs of people wearing leather coats on top of t-shirts and jeans and carried obvious weapons like chains or pipes with them wandered about. If one looked hard enough, they could also see the occasional suit, marking the more wealthy members of the miniature society.

"Gross," Ranma said from beside her. "It's like a gathering of all of the scum in Japan."

"It's a whole city down here," Ryouga commented. "What kind of place _is_ this?"

There was a sudden loud cheer and they all turned to see a large dome.

"I guess that's where we're going to be working then," Kazuma said.

Kanami blinked and looked up at him.

"We?" She asked.

"Er, I meant them," He said with a shrug.

"I'm surprised that a place like this exists in the Lost Ground," Ryouga said with a frown. "I mean, _why_?"

Nabiki snorted.

"Why not?" She asked as she started walking along the railing/street.

"Well, okay, but how can they afford to exist like this?" Ranma asked. "Seems like a waste of money no matter how you look at it."

"They're probably sponsored by people from the outside. The sort of exotic entertainment you can get from watching Alter Users fight can't really be bought anywhere else in the world, you know?" Ryouga snorted.

"And the betting, don't forget the betting!" Nabiki added in a sing-song voice.

"Anyway, that's the sort of people we're dealing with here." Ryouga shrugged, resisting the urge to point at her.

"Like I said earlier, buncha greedy bastards," Kazuma said, folding his arms behind his head. "Greedy bastards willing to share their wealth with whoever makes them richer. _And_, like I said, better us than any of the jerks already here." Kazuma said.

"Doesn't that make us as bad as the people here, though?" Kanami asked. "Dirty money is dirty money."

"Hey, hey… don't look at it that way. Just think of it as… when the money becomes ours, it becomes _clean_ money!" The brunette said with a smile. "These guys will get what's coming to them one day. For now, let's just have fun!"

"Fun? I don't see anywhere to do that," The small girl said, crossing her arms and frowning.

"True, doesn't exactly look like there's a lot of places for kids to hang out here, if you know what I mean." Ryouga said, looking over the rail at the streets below.

"Heh, don't worry about that. We've got you guys to keep her entertained. You can teach her more of that martial arts stuff, weren't you doing that?"

"What?" Ranma asked. "Well…"

"True, she's not working at the farm, and she'll get out of shape just loafing around," Ryouga said.

"That's not my idea of fun," Nabiki snorted. "Don't you guys worry your heads off. I've got something to keep her busy."

"Really?" Kanami asked. "Like what?"

"You've never used the internet before, have you?" Nabiki asked, looking down at her. All she got was a puzzled look in response. "I've found a bunch of neat things, I'll share them with you."

"For free?" The girl asked, suspiciously.

"Not if you test my patience." Nabiki said, smiling.

"Hmm…" The younger girl shrugged and they continued on.

"So where are we headed first?" Ranma asked, grabbing Ryouga by the shoulder as the other teen started straying off course.

"There's only one hotel here, really." Nabiki snorted.

"So the guys here make a habit out of running monopolies?" Ryouga snorted.

"Did you expect anything else?" The Tendo asked with a grin.

"Not really," Ryouga said, looking around. They reached the end of the rail and followed Nabiki down some stairs. "You know where to go?"

"I saw the place on the way down the elevator. It was in this direction, and I don't feel like asking any of the… _fine_ gentlemen here for anything more specific, you know?"

"Right." Kazuma snorted. "Let's just keep going."

_**-**__**スクライド**__**-**_

Around ten minutes later, the five stood before a tall building with a damaged neon sign on above the entrance. The entryway itself was two metallic doors with several suit wearing guards standing about. The building stood at the end of its own road and was surrounded by cavernous walls. The building rose up and out of sight into the cavernous ceiling, and Ranma found himself wondering if it went up to the surface.

"Hmm, if this is the only place, then the alter users should be around here, right?" Kazuma asked.

"No, actually," Nabiki said. "This place is primarily for the spectators." She said.

"What?" Kazuma blinked.

"Normally, you guys wouldn't be staying here, you'd just stay in the dome with all the other knuckle heads. And while Kimishima didn't want to pay for the extra security and service, I wouldn't have felt safe staying with the roughnecks. And I don't trust you guys to keep your hands clean either, so we're all staying here." She said.

"Don't trust us?" Kazuma asked. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"She knows one of us would have started a fight at some point," Ranma snorted with a smirk.

Kazuma scoffed.

"So?"

"It's hard to make money when you guys are beating up your competition before the betting can start." Nabiki said as she started walking towards the building. The rest of the group quickly followed suit. "I figure it'll be easier to keep it in your pants if you're not constantly tempted with someone right next to you."

Kazuma blushed and rubbed the back of his neck while Ranma and Ryouga chuckled.

Kanami blinked and looked up at the four of them.

"What's that supposed to mean?" She asked.

"Err,"

"Uhh…"

Nabiki rolled her eyes as the three males stuttered, then looked and smiled down at the younger girl.

"It means I expect the boys to behave. In more ways than one, I should add."

Ranma blushed that time.

"Hey!"

"Shut up," Nabiki said, as the security guards started to approach them.

"State your business." The apparent leader of the guards - a tall, bald, dark-skinned man with a black tattoo on his left cheek asked, holding up an automatic weapon in what was obviously supposed to be a threatening gesture. Ranma and Ryouga glared, but both Kazuma and Kanami looked unfazed by the display.

"We're here as guests." Nabiki said, reaching into a pocket. The guards all watched closely as she pulled out a small card with a large letter-number combination printed on and held it up. "My associates and I were invited to take part in some friendly competition, and I opted for the more decadent lodgings," She said with a smile. "The rest of this town just doesn't suit a delicate lady like myself, you know?"

The man didn't answer, instead taking the card and inspecting it. Another guard walked over and held up a small device that Nabiki thought resembled a barcode scanner, and the leader handed the card to him. Despite her initial appraisal of its use, however, the card was actually swiped _through_ the device and the man looked up.

"Two rooms," The man said. "Three ladies, and three men."

Nabiki smiled and nodded.

"That's right, one of our friends isn't here yet. The car had to be parked."

"You'll have to give her her key." The guard with the device said as reached into a pocket and pulled out several cards similar to the one he'd taken from Nabiki and handed them all to her.

"Right," She said with a nod.

"Wait a minute-" Ranma started, but he was immediately cut off.

"Ranma, could you come with me for a moment?" Nabiki asked, suddenly grabbing his hand. She pulled him away and the other four watched with interest while the security guards went back to their posts beside the metallic doors.

"What's going on here?" Ranma demanded as Nabiki pulled him away.

"Women and children are half off." The other teen said simply. "I need you to do this for me. Just to get in through the doors. When we're in our rooms, you can turn back into a man again if you want."

Ranma sighed.

"Whatever," he muttered with a resigned tone. "But the money you saved, you're giving it to me," He said.

"Forty percent," Nabiki said, turning around and starting back towards the group.

"One hundred," Ranma snapped as he followed her.

"Thirty." Nabiki said.

"What? You went down, damn it!" Ranma growled. "You can't just use people like this! I'm not just some tool for making and saving money, you know!"

"So twenty-five then?" Nabiki asked.

"A hundred, and it's non-negotiable!" Ranma snarled, clenching his fists.

Nabiki frowned and took a step back and frowned at him.

'_So he's finally growing a pair now, is he?_' She narrowed her eyes and sized him up. _'Hmm… this could get complicated. I can't have him getting too belligerent, but it won't do for him to get angry and do something drastic. That could take a while yet, but… I'll just have to be a little more creative._' She sighed and crossed her arms, looking at him in annoyance. "Sixty. I needed the extra money to pay for our food tonight," She said. "Is that agreeable?"

Ranma seemed to relax when she gave him the reason.

"Fine," He said. "Fine, whatever. Sixty."

"Okay. We're meeting Kimishima at the Dome." Nabiki said when they were back with the group. "He's meeting with the fine gentleman that invited us here. Ryouga and Kanami can check into our rooms right now." She looked down at Kanami. "Don't let him out of your sight, okay?"

The small girl nodded and Ryouga blushed.

"Hey…" The teen muttered. "Shouldn't it be the other way around?"

"Anyway," Nabiki said, looking at Ranma and Kazuma, "Let's go."

_**-**__**スクライド**__**-**_

Kimishima walked into a well lit room that was tastefully decorated and, rather than the acrid stench of sweaty flesh and dirt, smelled of fine cigars. The room was well cooled as well, unlike the rest of the city. At the end of the rug stood a large, ornate desk, behind which sat a corpulent, suit wearing man, a grand smile on his face.

"_Kunihiko!_" The man belted out in a loud voice. "What's it been, two years? How've you been, boy?"

"Uncle Izo!" Kimishima grinned. "I've been hanging in there. I see business is going well for you."

"Of course, of course." The man nodded. "When I'd heard that you were coming here for a visit, with the alter users that escaped from HOLD no less, you can imagine my surprise. But I've managed to make very good use of that news." The man said. "Where are they now?" He then gestured a chair to the side of his desk.

"They're on their way here right now," Kimishima said, sitting down with a nod.

"Good, good. Cigar?" The man offered, gesturing a box.

"Er, I still don't smoke, actually," Kimishima said.

"_Freedom States Premium_, son. You can't turn this down." The man said, laughing as he grabbed one out of the box. He cut off the tip with a double guillotine style cutter and held it out to the younger man. Kimishima chuckled and reluctantly accepted it, and let the older man light it for him. He took a drag on his cigar and let the smoke out in a relaxed sigh while the older man spoke once more. "So, tell me about these boys of yours. Where did you find them?"

_**-**__**スクライド**__**-**_

Ranma, Kazuma, and Nabiki looked up at the dome shaped building with slight frowns upon their faces. The walls were dirty concrete and metal, and a big archway lead inside. It was the junkiest looking building in the entire city, and the fact that the dome was partially destroyed only lent a more decrepit look to it.

"This place looks like fun," Kazuma said, pounding his fist to his palm. "I can't wait to get in there."

"No fighting today," Nabiki said. "Everything starts tomorrow, all right? We _really _don't need you guys screwing this up." She said as she lead them into the archway. "Kimishima's old friend runs this place, and it'll be very _inconvenient_ for us if suddenly the odds he's planning to run on you guys tomorrow have to be changed."

"I know, I know," Kazuma said, waving a hand at her. "Shaddap already, yeesh."

"I will when I feel confident you boys know how to properly behave," She said. As they walked into and through the lobby, a number of different men and even a few women turned their attention towards them, sneering and glaring in attempts to size them up.

_**-**__**スクライド**__**-**_

"Well, the reconnaissance mission is over…" a blue haired teen wearing a hooded cloak muttered as she walked into the restaurant. The smell of alcohol and smoke filled her nostrils right away, and she twisted her face at the stench. She looked around the room and noticed the usual effects; a few posters on the wall, a dusty old television on the wall in the corner, and a similarly aged analog clock hanging above as well. '_This place never changes,_' She thought, taking it all in. "Now to figure out how to pass the next four hours…" She walked to the bar and sat down.

"What can I get for you?" a mustached man asked, while wiping a glass with a towel.

"The usual," She said with a small smile as she hid her face from the man.

"Hmm? Excuse me?" The man asked as he walked over to her. "I'm sorry, but I don't think I…" His eyes widened as he saw her face. "…Sheri!"

'Sheri' smiled and pulled her hood back.

"It is you! I'll be damned!" The man looked at her in shock for a moment, then did a double take. "These old eyes ain't foolin', are they? Is it really you, Scheris?"

"You're not that old yet, gramps," Scheris said with a wink.

"I don't believe it. It's been years!" The old man said. "I heard you'd run off and joined HOLY!"

"You heard wrong," She said. "There's no way I'd join a group of tight-asses like that, gramps. Come on, be serious!"

"Of course, of course," He nodded with a knowing smile. "I can't believe it. How've you been? You've gotten taller since I last saw you!"

She snickered.

"Of course I have, it's been years," She said. "I've been doing well enough. Staying out of trouble, you know?"

"Right," The man nodded. "So what brings you back to this part of the Lost Ground? Looking to get in on the coliseum?"

"You know my alter doesn't work like that," She said with a small smile. "I'm not a fighter. But I am hungry."

"Oh, right! Look at me… forgetting the first order of business," He muttered. "The usual, eh? Sure you don't want anything more?" He chuckled. "You're a big girl now, after all."

"Heh, I'll be fine," She said.

"Nonsense," The man snorted. "This dieting foolishness you girls like to do so the boys think you're pretty is stupid. I can see, you haven't been eating enough," He said. "Here, you just wait here, I won't let you leave without eating a full dinner!" The man turned and made his way to the kithen. "Ey, 'Eriko! You'll never guess who's here!"

Scheris's face fell as she watched the man's retreating form disappear behind the swivel door.

'_I joined HOLY because things were supposed to be better. And they are, for me… but for the people here, life has stayed exactly the same.'_ She sighed and looked down at the bar. '_Well, that all changes tonight… nothing will be the same._'

_**-**__**スクライド**__**-**_

Ranma, Kazuma, Kimishima, and Nabiki all walked out of the coliseum's owner's room and into a hallway, where two men in suits and bearing assault rifles stood guard.

"Well, that went well," Nabiki said.

"He seemed nice, for a kingpin," Ranma agreed. "What now?"

"I need to get something from the car," Kimishima said. "The rest of you can do whatever you want."

"Heh, suits me," Kazuma said with a smirk.

"Oh no you don't. Remember what I said about no fighting," Nabiki said with a glare.

"Oh… damn…" Kazuma's cheer dissipated instantly. "Wait a minute, it shouldn't matter if people don't see me, right? So say, if some assholes 'jump' me in a dark, dank alleyway with no one around to help me…"

Nabiki frowned.

"Fine, but try not to cause too much destruction," She said and Kazuma grinned before shoving his hands in his pockets and walking away.

"Well then, I think I'll go for a _walk!_" He called back to them.

Ranma just shook his head.

"Yeesh," He muttered.

"Anyway, I'm going to the hotel. Kunihiko, pick up dinner on the way back, would you? You have the money on you right?" She said as she moved to follow after him.

"Miss Tendou," The three of them blinked, and turned around to see one of Izo's personal guards walking towards them. "The boss is requesting that you return to his office."

She blinked.

"I wonder what it could be. Well, there's no turning down our generous host," she said, turning around. "You two go on. I'll be quick."

"Right. Ranma," Kimishima said, and both he and Ranma moved to follow as well.

"So how long have you known that guy?" Ranma asked.

"Uncle Izo?" Kimishima asked, looking at him. "I met him eight years ago, when he handpicked me from an orphanage. I kind of met almost everyone I know now through him. Used to work for him, actually, but he said I should get out and see the world…"

_**-**__**スクライド**__**-**_

Scheris looked up at the television and sighed. On the TV was the local evening news being broadcast from the city. Before she'd gone to HOLY, she'd always wondered why people bothered watching the news; it only pertained to the people in Logos; Revenus with access to a Television would be better off watching static. The only good programs that weren't fictional were the exposés on Native Alters and HOLY's attempts to capture and contain their reckless violence. Even though she _did _live in the city now, she had as little interest in the news as ever.

"Why the long face?"

"Hmm?" Scheris looked up at the man leaning against the bar beside her. He was slightly older than her and had a braided pigtail hanging from the back of his head. He was handsome, in Ryuhou's league, even, and had a sort of roguish charm about him. But unlike Ryuhou's air of mysterious calm, this man had a palpable aura of playful confidence. She smiled up at him. "Buy me a drink, and I'll tell you," She said.

"Heh, really?" The pig tailed man grinned, then looked over at the bartender. "Hey, mister. Get this girl a cup of… hot tea, would you?" He asked, fetching a bill out of his pocket and tossing it on the bar. The man looked over at him, blinked, and looked over at Scheris, who giggled. The pig-tailed man looked down at her and kept smiling. "Heh, I knew you'd look better with a smile on your face. So what's eating you?"

"Hot tea?" The blue haired girl asked. "Really?"

"I've got a phobia of cold drinks." The older teen said without missing a beat. "You could say I have colddrinkphobia."

Scheris couldn't help it; she giggled. She didn't know why she was laughing; what he'd said wasn't all that funny… but something about the way he said it got to her.

"That's not even a word," She muttered. "Okay, fine. Fair enough. You bought me a drink." She said, looking up at him. "Okay then. My… boyfriend has been paying me less and less attention," She said. "So I'm just wondering if he's… lost interest."

The man blinked, and tilted his head.

"Boyfriend?" He asked.

"Heh, yeah. Sorry about that." She said with a chuckle. "You don't really have to buy that drink, you know."

The pig-tailed teen chuckled as well and shook his head.

"No, it's alright. I dislike seeing cute girls looking all sad and stuff, anyway." He said. "Boyfriend, eh…"

She glanced up at him and noticed he seemed to be spacing out.

"You have one too?" She asked with a smirk, before looking away.

"Hell no!" He said, looking somewhat affronted. She giggled again and his frown melted. "Heh, well. You seem nice enough."

"Hm?" She blinked and looked up at him again.

"You're cute, you're smart, and you've got a nice sense of humor," He said. "You're everything my girl isn't. Well, save for the cute part," He snorted. "But man does she have a temper."

"Tell me about it…" The bartender muttered.

"But anyway," the teen continued. "Listen. You're a great girl. If this guy has a brain, he's not going to let you go."

She blinked and looked up at him. He seemed to be focused on the bar more than her. His eyes had a distant look to them.

"It's just, sometimes, guys need their distance." He said. "Maybe he's troubled over something. Maybe he's just been in a bad mood, lately. But you should probably just let him sort it out. If he wants your help, he'll seek you out, you know? The best thing you can do in this situation is continue to support him, and make sure he knows you're there."

She stared up at him, slightly surprised.

"Well spoken, young man." The bartender said with a nod.

"Heh, thanks." The teen said with a nod of his own. He looked down at Scheris and smiled. "Anyway, if this guy ends up leaving you, then let me assure you, the problem wasn't on your end. It was him."

"Hey Ranma! Food's ready!" The man turned his head and his pigtail whipped to the side. She could see another man, clad in a dark green coat, orange shirt, and khaki pants standing at the other end of the bar, where a heavyset woman – who she recognized as the restaurant's cook, and the bartender's wife, was handing him several bags with food containers in it. "Stop flirting and come give me a hand here!"

"'Kay!" The pig-tailed teen said, before turning to look at her one more time. "Well, nice meeting you. You try and keep that smile on your face, okay?" He said with one of his own. "I'll see you around. You too, gramps."

"Ey, you not gonna leave that there, are ya?" The bartender asked, gesturing towards the bill he'd put on the counter. The teen glanced at it, then looked at the blue haired girl again.

"She can use it to buy herself something nice. I don't need a lot of money. See ya." He said, before turning and walking away.

Scheris watched him walk away for a moment.

"Boyfriend, huh…" She muttered, looking over at the bill. '_Ryuhou's not even really my boyfriend…_' She thought, looking down at her empty plate and cup. _'Hmm… nah… it'd never work out. He said he had someone already anyway. Look at me…' _She smiled a small smile and chuckled again.

"So, tell me about this boyfriend," The bartender said with a smile of his own as he pushed the bill towards her. "What's he look like? I'm sure he's big and strong," He said.

"Actually, he's lean. Muscular, but lean," She said with a smile as she began to describe her personal dreamboat for the old man.

_**-**__**スクライド**__**-**_

Ryuhou stood with several other HOLY members in a dark room lit only by a single light bulb. The focused beam of light shined down, illuminating the terrain map on the table before him. The room shifted suddenly, and they all jerked when the vehicle they were in hit a bump in the road. Martin Zigmarl stood beside Ryuhou, straightening the map out on the table.

"Alright, we'll review the mission one last time. As you know, this is the base of operations for the largest organized criminal group in the Lost Ground. Though on the surface it appears to be no more than a junk heap, some twenty meters below us is a small city made up of buildings that used to occupy the surface here. Though we are currently unsure of how they moved the buildings without destroying them, it is suspected that an Alter User was involved."

The man then pointed to lines on the map. There was a blue, vaguely circular shape drawn on it, with a black blob scribbled inside it. Red arrows pointed from the blue outline to the black blob.

"The other HOLD units will fan out and surround the enclave from these directions, blocking them from escaping on the surface. While they are doing this, the demolitions team and our own Izuka will be laying charges around the areas that are structurally weakest. Once the charges go off, the structural integrity of the caverns will be heavily compromised. The thin surface layer of bedrock will fall into the settlement and we'll be able to send HOLD and HOLY members down. You will all descend to the subterranean area with a single HOLD unit each and sweep the area for any alter users and other criminals-" He pointed at the red lines, "-while escorting civilians and injured to the medical stations that will be set up along the perimeter." He pointed out the blue line surrounding the black line.

"This vehicle will be our mobile command center. From here Elian will monitor the barricade for any Revenus trying to escape, and Scheris will be assisting the medical team." The man glanced up at each of his soldiers in turn. "Any questions?"

They each traded looks and Ryuhou spoke up.

"No, sir." The green haired teen said.

"Good. Ready for deployment at once. This is the start of what could be the last crackdown in your careers as HOLY officers."

_**-**__**スクライド**__**-**_

"Well, it's about time for me to go," Scheris said, looking up at the clock. She was sitting at a table with the bartender and his plump wife. The television had been turned off to save on the electricity bill, as most of the day's customers had already come and gone; only a few well known regulars were left at that point. "My man will start to worry if I'm not back soon. He's not used to this place." She said with a giggle, standing up.

"Make him worry then," The bartender's wife said. "He's been spending less time with you, right? Make him worry just a little, and he'll remember why he's with you in the first place." The woman suggested.

"Mom, dad, we're home!" two young voices called out in chorus from the kitchen.

"Oh ho, just in time," the bartender said. "Setsuko, Kintaro! Get in here!" The man said. "You won't believe who's here!"

Scheris held her breath as two familiar figures walked through the swivel door and into the bar. She smiled and the both of them looked at her in total and complete shock.

"Sis!" two preteens cried out, before running around the bar and over to her.

"Hey hey! No running in the restaurant! You'll knock over everything!" The mother said, and the two kids made a noticeable effort to avoid any tables and chairs before they tackled Scheris in a bear hug from either side. The blue haired teen struggled to stand under their combined assault.

"Hey, stop that! You're too big for that crap now!" She moaned.

"I don't believe it! It's really you!" The boy said, looking up at her. "You're even taller than I remember!"

"Hah! See, I told you she'd come back. There's no way sis woulda joined up with HOLY!" The young girl said. "Isn't that right, sis?"

"Heh," Scheris rubbed her head. "Well, not unless they paid me a billion, nah." She said. "You guys aren't so small anymore either." She smiled. "It's been too long. Unfortunately, I have to go," She said.

"Aww, what? So soon?" The two kids asked, obviously disappointed.

"Someone's waiting for me," She said. "I promised him I'd do something for him tonight, so I kind of have to go. Can't be breaking promises,"

The bartender sighed.

"You kids grow up so fast these days." He said wistfully. "Do be sure to use a condom, dear."

Scheris blushed, and the two kids made disgusted faces, while the man's wife hit him sharply on the shoulder.

"Forgive my husband, he's such a pervert," The woman said, glaring at him.

"No worse than I remember," Scheris snickered.

"Anyway," The woman said, smiling up at her. "Are you sure you can't stay longer?"

"Unfortunately," The blue-haired teen said with a sad smile.

"Well, you be sure to visit again soon, okay? Keep us waiting that long again, and I'll send the little hounds to drag you back here." She said. "Isn't that right?"

"That's right, you'd better come back or else!" The young girl said with a frown as she looked up at the other girl.

"Alright, alright," Scheris said as she pulled away from the two kids. "I'll come back and see you before three years is up. Don't worry." She said with a smile.

"Hey, you better mean that," The boy said.

"Of course," Scheris said as she adjusted her cloak and pulled her hood up over her head. Her movements slowed and she looked at the small family, her smile fading away.

"Well, you two go wash the dishes," The mother said as she stood up.

"Aww… man…" The two kids groaned and grumbled as they walked away.

The woman continued.

"I'm going to take a bath. Tsutomu, _don't_ forget to lock the doors when you close up," She said as she turned and started walking away.

"I forgot that _one_ time and she never gets off my ass about it," the man muttered, before looking up at Scheris. "You should get going, shouldn't you?"

"Actually…" She started, "I'm not part of HOLY, but I've… met a group of alter users like me…" She said.

"You did? That's good," The man said. "Your boyfriend one of them?"

She nodded.

"The thing is… we've been keeping an eye on HOLY recently… and…" She looked him in the eyes. "They're getting serious," She said. "HOLY seems to be under pressure to produce results, thanks to the native alters that escaped from their compound in the city…"

"So it _is_ true!" The man muttered. "Native Alters _did _escape from HOLY prison! Ha, take that, you arrogant sons of _bitches_!" The man snorted, before returning his attention to her. "I take it those alter users were part of your little group?"

She paused for a moment, then nodded.

"I was seeing that on the news earlier," The man said. "They were branded terrorists." He snorted. "_Terrorists!_ Can you believe that?"

"It gets worse," Scheris said. "HOLY is moving in force, but also, it seems that the Logos National Defense Force has used the ordeal as an excuse to finally get a legitimate reason to send _Phantom_ here to the Lost Ground."

The man stared at her for a moment, silent, and his eyes slowly widened.

"Ph-Phantom?" The man asked. "You… you don't mean that, do you? You're not _serious?_ I mean, _Phantom?_ There must be some sort of mistake…"

She shook her head.

"It's been confirmed. HOLD will be deferring authority on all matters regarding the Lost Ground to Phantom and the Logos National Defense Force starting next week."

The man simply sat there in abject shock.

"They're bringing in the _goddamned army?_" He muttered after a long moment. "I don't… you've got to be…"

"Gramps. You should leave the Lost Ground. As soon as you can." She said. "None of you are Alter Users. You can survive out there."

"But… we can't… the restaurant… we don't have the _money_…" The man muttered, shaking his head. "I don't _believe_ this… bullshit. _Bullshit! _They're turning the _national_ _army_ on their own people? Fucking Logos!" He growled and stood up.

"Oji-san…" She said, looking around. The other customers were looking at them, but the man kept swearing. "Akiyama-oji-san!" He stopped and looked down at her, surprised at the sudden shout. "This is no time to panic. You've got to move. You have a family. You need to protect them!" She said, frowning. The man stared at her for a moment, before shaking his head.

"…You're right." He shook his head. "What am I thinking…" The man paused and looked down at her. "Thank you for telling me this… but…" The man sighed and sat down. "What are we to do? We _can't_ leave the lost ground, even if we had the money."

Scheris frowned.

"Why not?"

He looked up at her.

"Well…The twins, they're… Since you left, some things happened, and we found out… they're…" He stopped there and hung his head.

"Alter Users," Scheris breathed.

The man looked up at her.

"You… your group, you take in alter users, don't you?"

She nodded.

"Can you help us?"

Scheris stared at him for a moment, then frowned.

"We… we do a lot of fighting against other alter users. We strive to be a real force of justice… unlike HOLY. We… try to show that native alters can be good too. It'd be too dangerous," She said, shaking her head. "I'm the youngest member on the team already, and they only accepted me because my power is special. I'm not normally exposed… to danger…" She said, her eyes losing focus. "That's probably why, then…"

"Hm?" The man asked.

"I just realized something," The blue haired teen, said, shaking her head. "It's nothing. But no, that's not an option." She said.

"Well okay…" He nodded. "Is there… is there anything else you can tell me about the situation?"

She shook her head.

"HOLY units have been seen in this area recently. That's all I know. If I were you, I would get away from here as soon as possible. Tonight, even, if possible. If it becomes an all out battle…"

The man nodded.

"Thank you," He said.

"Well, I've got to go." She said. "…Everyone's waiting for me."

"Of course." He nodded. She turned and started out, but he called out to her. "…Scheris. You've grown well. I'm happy for you." He said.

She stopped and bowed her head.

'_No I haven't,_' she gritted her teeth. "Thank you." She said, before continuing on her way. "Remember what I said."

With that, she made her way out of the restaurant and kept walking until she stood before the elevator that would take her back to the surface.

_**-**__**スクライド**__**-**_

Ryuhou walked out of the armored carrier, dressed in the same body armor as regular HOLD members, but with a purple and white scheme, indicating his position as an Alter User. His helmet was similarly colored, with only the visor a dark blue. The usual HOLY uniform had been abandoned for this mission, as its flamboyant design was likely to cause mobility problems in the chaos that was to ensue that night.

The moon was blocked by thick cloud cover, but the mobile base was far enough away from the enclave that they could afford to light the immediate area up with the equivalent of a single street light. He walked towards a second vehicle, whose door was open, revealing its interior. He walked in and looked around, seeing several scientists working at computer consoles around the room. He quickly found the woman he was looking for and walked over to her side.

"Mimori-san," he started, "It's not necessary that you put yourself in danger like this. There are going to be alter users present." He said.

"I am aware of this, Ryuhou," The young woman said. "You're still injured from that attack, yet you're here as well."

"That's different," Ryuhou said. "I am a soldier. It is my duty…"

"And it is my duty to help where I can, as well." She said, turning to look up at him. "I'm not just going to sit back at base and attend tea parties just because my family wants me to. I refuse to be useless." She turned back to the computer and went back to work, and Ryuhou just stared at her for a moment. He looked over her shoulder and at the screen she was working on for a moment.

"I understand. Please continue to assist in any way that you can." He turned and walked away.

Mimori watched him go out of the corner of her eyes and turned her attention back to the computer.

'_I'll help in my own way,'_ She thought, typing several commands into the computer. '_This entire plan is reckless… I know we can't just go down there and ask that they reform to society… it simply won't work. But there are a large number of innocents in that underground settlement. But if I can delay some of the explosives, that should give them enough time to respond to the initial attack, and get everyone they can to safety. After that, I'll join the medical teams and do what I can for those who weren't injured.'_

Ryuhou walked out of the vehicle and looked up at the clouds before walking towards the base of operations.

'_Scheris is late…'_

_**-**__**スクライド**__**-**_

Ranma stared up at the ceiling with a frown on his face. He grunted and turned on his side, putting an arm over his head, staring straight ahead. Though his night vision was good, without a single window or alternative source of light, it was pitch black and he couldn't see in front of his face. He was exhausted both mentally and physically; the past few nights had seen trouble sleeping for him, and doing katas when he couldn't sleep as well as sparring during the day was starting to take its toll on him.

He yawned audibly and stretched his arms up above his head, rolling onto his back and folding them between his head and his pillow.

'_Akane… I wonder where you are. What happened to you? Did you get old? Did you get married? Do you have kids?' _His face was strangely blank, and the thoughts echoing in his head were in a neutral tone. '_At sixty four, she could have grandkids my age, if not older. She'd be older than pops was when I left.'_ He chuckled. _'Well, when I do see her, that's the first thing I'm gonna mention.'_

Ranma lay there silent, for several minutes, listening to the snores of his companions. At some point he closed his eyes once more and finally drifted off to sleep.

Five minutes later, the building suddenly rocked violently, jerking him and the others out of their rest.

Ranma sat up, looking around, and Kimishima groaned.

"What was that? An earthquake?" The young man asked as he slowly sat up.

"I'm not sure," Ryouga said. "Could be."

"Mm… well, we're safe in here, right..?" Kazuma asked in the middle of a yawn. "These guys wouldn't be living here if it weren't safe from earthquakes…"

The building shook again, even more violently, accompanied by a loud boom in the distance and they were all thrown about. Kimishima groaned in pain as he hit the floor from his bed.

"I don't think that was an earthquake…" Ryouga said.

"Do you think they're fighting in the dome?" Ranma asked.

"Could be. If so… I'd love to see what the hell's causing this kinda commotion," Kazuma said with a grin.

"Wait a second," Ranma said, climbing to his feet. The room was silent for a moment, then… "Do you hear that?"

The room was silent for a short time again. Faintly, in the distance, they could hear it; the sounds of gunfire.

"…The _hell_?" Kazuma asked. "Why would they be…"

"Somebody get the damn lights," Kimishima said. "I don't like this."

Ranma quickly moved to do so and turned the lights on to see the other guys were all standing up, Kimishima rubbing his eyes.

"It's too late for this shit…" The man muttered. "Somebody find out what the hell is going on here."

"I'm on it," Kazuma said as he finished putting his shoes on and started walking towards the door.

"I'll go with." Ranma said.

"I'm going too." Ryouga said.

"No way, we don't need you getting lost right now," Ranma snorted, and Ryouga frowned, but he continued before the lost boy could say anything. "You stay here in case something happens while we're away."

"Hmph. Fine." Ryouga crossed his arms as the other two walked out of the room and into the hallway. They both turned and saw Kanami standing before the open door of the room she shared with Nabiki.

"Kanami?" Kazuma asked. "Did Nabiki leave already?"

The younger girl noticed them and nodded, biting her lip.

"She went downstairs to see what was going on."

"We're going down there too, but I want you to stay here, okay?" Ranma said. She nodded and they both jogged down the hall and jumped down the center of the stairwell. Both landed noisily on the ground floor and ran into the lobby, where a gaggle of people were scrambling about in frenzied panic, yelling and screaming. Ranma and Kazuma glanced at each other and ran to the door, which they opened, and stared out into the city.

There was a massive dust cloud, but the constant sound of gunfire was now far more audible and the screams of those under fire could be heard clearly. Rubble and large boulders lay strewn about in the ground.

"_Holy shit_," Ranma turned and looked at his companion, whose jaw was now hanging freely. "Is that what I think it is?" The boy asked, pointing up. Ranma followed his gaze into the swirling cloud of dust and stared, narrowing his eyes for a moment… before they widened in surprise.

"I think it is…" Ranma muttered. "But um… why would we be seeing the sky from underground?"

"Because we're not underground anymore," Came a familiar voice. They both turned to see Nabiki running towards them with an assault rifle strapped over a shoulder. Their eyes bugged even more when they noticed the gun. "I picked this up off of someone who won't be needing it anymore," She said coolly. "Now, we need to _hurry up_ and get _out_ of here. HOLD and HOLY are both attacking. They collapsed the ceiling with some powerful explosives and are sweeping the entire settlement for alter users."

"_What?"_ Kazuma asked, shock clear on his and Ranma's faces. "You've got to be shitting me…"

"No, I am most certainly not," The young teen said as she pushed past them and into the door. "We're going to have to leave the clothes we brought; they're too cumbersome and inconvenient. We'll just have to get more later."

"Hey, wait a second," Ranma said, following her into the building. "Do you even know how to use that thing?" He asked.

"I learn quick," She said as she made a beeline for the stairs with both of them in tow. "I don't plan to use this if I don't really need to." She said.

"How the hell are we going to get out of here?" Ranma asked. "If they're smart, they've got the whole place surrounded on the surface. And considering they have the high ground, the advantage is completely theirs." He pointed out.

"We're going to have to slip through their lines one way or another," Nabiki said, turning on the stairs and starting up another flight.

"Can't we just punch a hole in them and get out like that?" Kazuma asked as he shuffled up the stairs behind her.

"This is not the small group that arrested you guys before. This is a full-on assault," Nabiki said. "They're trying to save face. With all those rumors of you guys escaping, they likely decided they needed to make a show of force to quash any ideas that they weren't infallible. I'm guessing they knew this place was here for a while, but didn't bother doing anything about it because it was more convenient to leave it as it was." They turned onto their floor and Nabiki pantingly walked straight to her room. "Damn stairs…" She muttered. "You guys tell them what's going on! I'm getting my stuff!"

Ranma and Kazuma simply kept running until they made it to their room, where Kanami, Ryouga, and Kimishima all looked up at them in surprise. The latter was standing over his bed and holding the dark green coat he normally wore, in his hands.

"What's going on?" Ryouga demanded.

"We're leaving, now," Kazuma said, gesturing behind him. "Forget anything that you can't carry out of here. We've got to go."

"Huh? Why?" Kanami asked.

"HOLD and HOLY," Ranma said. "They blew out the ceiling and are _arresting_ everyone in sight."

"You can't be _serious_." Ryouga said with a half-frown, half-stunned look on his face.

"Unfortunately," Ranma said.

"Damn it," The lost boy muttered as he started walking towards them.

"Aww, hell!" Kimishima groaned as he shrugged on his dark green overcoat and adjusted it. "There goes our plan…"

"Why are they doing this?" Kanami asked. "Is it because of the people here?"

"A lot of reasons, but this just goes to prove that they can't be trusted. Such a reckless tactic, who knows how many people were injured by the falling debris?" Ryouga muttered.

Ranma nodded in solemn agreement, and Kazuma just clenched his fists and teeth.

"It's obvious they just don't care," Ranma snorted.

"We can't just let this go." Kazuma started, "Kanami and the others can run, but HOLY and HOLD have to pay for this."

"And just what are you going to do?" Kazuma froze as he felt the cold metal barrel on his neck and a familiar voice. "Do you seriously think you're going to take them on, one on one? You really think you can make a difference by fighting them here?"

"Nabiki!" Ryouga shouted in surprise. "What the hell are you doing!"

"Talking some sense into this dumbshit." She said. "Listen, Kazuma. You are one of the only three people that stands between this entire group, and being _arrested _by HOLY. Don't forget that the little girl you brought here is in just as much danger as the rest of us. Now, if it were just you, then fine, you can throw your life away for all I care. But right now, this group is depending on you. You need to remember that from now on, because I won't tolerate any more stupidity."

Kazuma just stared ahead, a cold expression on his face.

"You _bitch_," He muttered.

"Call me what you want. I don't care. But I'm not about to endanger this group because of one idiot's _idiot_ ideas. Capiche?"

There was silence.

"…fine." Kazuma said.

"Good." She removed the business end of her rifle from the back of his neck and walked into the room, and everyone save Kimishima stared at her in a completely new light. "Now, we're getting the hell out of here. All of us." She looked down at Kanami. "Is there anything you can do that we should be aware of? It's important that I take everyone's abilities into account for this. You understand, right?"

Everyone but Kanami looked at her in confusion. Kanami's eyes widened in surprise, but then she quickly shook her head.

"I… I can't do anything special," She said. "I just… have dreams."

Nabiki nodded.

"It's probably latent." She said. "That's too bad. I could have used another strong-arm…" She frowned and looked the group over. "Okay, here's the plan. First, we're going to make our way to the garage, where Kimishima's car is. If HOLD and HOLY aren't there, and it works, then we can use the elevator there to get to the surface, together with his car. Hopefully HOLD doesn't know about the garage and doesn't have the area where it comes up cordoned off."

"That's assuming the garage hasn't caved in," Ryouga said with a frown. "Wouldn't it be easier for me to just dig our way out of here with the Bakusai Tenketsu?"

"I'm not surprised that you just suggested that after mentioning the caving in that's going on around here," Nabiki muttered. "After those explosions, and rocks falling and people dying, I don't think the earth around here is all too stable," She said. "Although… Hmm… that may work out to our advantage." She looked over at him. "I've got a plan B, but let's hope we don't have to use it. Come on, let's go," She said, turning around and walking back out the door.

Soon they were down the stairs. The lobby had thinned to a point of being almost empty in that short amount of time. They walked outside and noticed that the dust cloud had cleared some. In the distance, several large alters could be seen – a giant, floating robot was being attacked by something too small for them to see in great detail. The large robot tried to counter attack several times before it was hit by an explosion that sent it crashing to the ground.

"Hell…" Ranma muttered. "I can't believe we're missing out on that,"

"Don't you start." Nabiki growled. "Now, Kanami, you stick close to me and Kunihiko." The younger girl nodded and she looked over at Ranma. "Ranma, I want you to scout ahead. Kazuma and Ryouga will stay with the rest of us as protection and to keep from getting lost."

Ryouga frowned and muttered at that, but the rest of the group seemed to accept it. Kimishima reached into his coat and pulled out a pistol in each hand, earning him a look of surprise from Ranma and Ryouga.

"What is this, a battle formation?" Ranma muttered, looking them over.

"Yes. That is exactly what this is," Nabiki said, also looking them over.

"Where did _you_ learn anything about battle?" Ranma demanded.

"Two thousand," She said.

"Add it to my tab, _this_ I have to _know_," Ranma said.

"Fine. Some of us paid attention in school," Nabiki said. "My first year history teacher was a big fan of Sun Tzu. You couldn't go through that class without learning a thing or two."

"I thought you were busy counting and re-counting your money," Ranma muttered.

"I can multitask," She said. "Now get going. You remember where the garage is, right?" She asked.

"Yeah," He nodded. He'd long since gotten accustomed to memorizing every possible escape path in a given situation, and she likely knew it.

"Then get going," She said. He nodded and took off, vanishing from sight, and she turned and looked the rest of them over. "Stick together. That's the only way we're getting out of this mess. Keep an eye out for ambush. Come on."

She turned and started walking down the path into the dusty city, under the light of the stars and moon above. The streets, cracked and broken before, were now littered with rubble from buildings that had been destroyed by the boulders falling on them, as well as the boulders themselves and piles of junk that'd been above ground, in various sizes. One particular building had been utterly crushed beneath one such boulder, and blood gathered in pools around it, signifying the unfortunates who'd been inside when the explosives had gone off.

Bright lights could be seen all around them on the distant surface where the armored HOLD vehicles sat in wait just beyond the edge of the precipice. While the rest of the group looked about, she surreptitiously turned off the safety switch on her weapon.

'_I severely underestimated this organization's ruthlessness,'_ She thought with a frown as she followed Kazuma along the streets. _'This place is a warzone.'_

Just then, there were multiple explosions almost directly overhead, and they all turned their heads to the source. High above the hotel, huge boulders were falling.

"Run!" Nabiki shouted, and the five of them did just that and ran as fast as they could as the rumbling behind them continued. There was a loud crash, and Nabiki turned around to see the huge chunks of earth land on the hotel, and the tower-like building quickly gave under the pressure, bending forward and then snapping in half, with yet another boulder landing on and crushing the bottom half of the building further. The group slowed down to a stop and watched in a sort of shocked awe as the top half of the building landed with a loud crash, followed by it being immediately smashed by the boulder that had torn it apart from the support in the first place. Steel frame and concrete were rent like so much paper beneath the unimaginable weight of the colossal boulder, which shattered upon hitting the ground, sending rubble flying their way.

"Move!" Kimishima shouted, and they turned and kept running. Nabiki grabbed hold of Ryouga's arm to hold him steady as Kazuma picked Kanami up and carried her over his shoulder, and they ran.

_**-**__**スクライド**__**-**_

Ranma leapt from building to building, each landing making no more sound than a leaf fluttering about the wind. He ignored the gunshots in the distance, instead focusing on the surrounding area and that of his destination. He flinched each time he noticed someone caught beneath rubble, jumping to do a quick pulse check and then growing more and more disappointed with each find.

'_These guys… they're monsters,_' He thought. _'Ryouga was right. They just don't give a damn about these people. Did us escaping really cause them that much trouble?'_ He frowned. _'I can't imagine that Ryuhou guy going through with this sort of thing. He seemed like a good guy, as far as these idiots have gone so far. But the rest of them seemed to be too ready to follow this sort of order._'

He froze suddenly and without a thought, leapt up, flipped in the air and landed on a building. He peered down from the roof as a group of armed soldiers rounded the corner. Most of them were dressed like regular HOLD soldiers, but one of them had purple and white body armor instead, and his helmet and visor matched the color scheme. Eight neon green spheres orbited around the man's body, leaving trails of light in their wake.

"Pair up, fan out and search the area. If you encounter any hostiles, do _not_ engage them on your own. Inform me and the rest of the group." The man in purple said. "If you find any civilians, inform us and the rescue team and wait until someone arrives to escort them away. We are to minimize casualties on both sides. These are vice-commander Tairen's orders."

Ranma narrowed his eyes. What a joke – minimize casualties after dropping the goddamned _ceiling_ on them? He wanted to punch the man's face in, badly.

"Yes, Sir!"

The group dispersed and Ranma frowned.

"This is bad news," He muttered, standing up. He leapt down into some rubble and winced as he landed on a small rock that he hadn't seen. He quickly adjusted himself to keep from twisting his foot and fell, sliding down the broken concrete and hitting the rubble in the center. He hit several rocks on the way down and landed with a small crash. A nearby pipe sticking out of the torn street suddenly spurted cold water onto him and she frowned.

"What was that? I heard something!" A nearby voice said. "Back this way!"

"Crap," Ranma muttered, quickly erasing every trace of her own chi and staying low.

Two soldiers ran by up above and she held her breath, waiting for them to go by. The two men hung in the area for a few moments before muttering amongst themselves and heading away.

_**-**__**スクライド**__**-**_

Nabiki looked around, keeping her hands on the rifle strapped around her neck. She had no idea how to use the damn thing other than pulling the trigger, but it made her feel much safer than she'd be feeling without it, of that she was certain.

When Ranma suddenly appeared, crouched before her, she pointed her weapon at the other girl.

"Hey, there's- what the hell are you doing? Stop pointin' that thing my way!" Ranma cried out.

"Prove you're who you look like," Nabiki said.

"What?" Ranma frowned. "Oh come_ on_, now you're just getting paranoid!" Ranma said.

"In my time here, I've seen Alter Users do all sorts of crazy things." Nabiki said. "I would not be surprised if one of them could make a believable illusion of some sort. Now…"

"Geez, fine." Ranma spat. "Just bring me some hot water and I'll prove it."

"That works." Nabiki nodded and lowered her weapon. "What's the sitrep?"

"Ugh… Anyway, there's a group of soldiers in the area. They're looking for _hostiles_ in groups of two. They're not to engage any that they find, just trail 'em and alert the rest of the group," She said.

Nabiki frowned.

"They could be watching us right now," She said.

"Do we look like hostiles?" Kazuma asked. "I mean…"

"As far as they care, everyone is hostile," Ryouga growled.

"And these guns aren't helping any," Kanami said with a sigh.

"True, but they'll help more than it would if we don't keep them," Nabiki said. "We need to keep moving. Ranma, go ahead and check the garage without us. We need to know if it's any good. If not, we have to look for another way out. Everyone else be on the lookout for soldiers. If we see any, then we disable them as soon as possible."

"I think it would be better for us to hole up in one of the buildings and wait for the soldiers to leave," Ryouga argued. "There's less chance of being caught that way and it's safer for Ranma."

"Everything in this place is liable to collapse any minute," Nabiki said. "The hotel wasn't as adversely affected because it was on the outer rim, but I'm sure it took structural damage as well. The sooner we're out of here the better."

"Besides, I can handle the heat, porky," Ranma said. "It's cute that you're worried, really, but…"

Ryouga just growled.

"Whatever, idiot."

"Okay then, let's go." Nabiki said. Ranma nodded and vanished from sight again and the group started moving once more. Kazuma took point; they moved quietly along the road, sticking on the sidewalk and close to buildings except to get around rubble and boulders. Nabiki looked around warily as she followed him with Kimishima and Kanami standing beside her, until suddenly Kazuma held up a hand.

"Hold up."

The group waited silently for a short moment, before they heard the approaching footfalls of men in boots from the side of the building they were up against.

"Hide. Quickly," Nabiki said in a low tone. They all ran and ducked behind a pile of rubble. Nabiki peered over the rubble and saw two men walk out from behind the building, bearing assault rifles with flashlights attached. The two men stopped for a moment and started to look around, and she duck down beneath the rubble.

Nabiki held her breath as she noticed the flashlights pass by overhead. The lights passed by two more times before she could hear one of the men speak suddenly.

"This is group D. Sector D-6 is clear of hostiles and civilians. Proceeding with sweep towards Sector D-3."

Nabiki looked up and noticed the flashlights were not pointed in her direction. She chanced a peek over the rubble and noticed the two men suddenly started walking in their direction. As one of the flashlights swept up towards her face, she ducked down again and looked over towards the rest of the group.

Ryouga and Kazuma were gritting their teeth, and seeing Kanami, who'd taken residence behind a smaller piece of debris, it was easy to see why; she would clearly be in the sight range of those two soldiers in a few short seconds, as the rubble was only big enough to hide her at a good distance. The small girl nervously looked over at her, clearly frightened. Nabiki tightened her gripp on the rifle and bit back a growl.

'Damn it, they had to pick _this_ direction in a four way intersec-'

Her ruminations were cut short as she heard something heavy move, and she quickly turned her head in time to see that Kazuma was no longer kneeling beside Ryouga. She quickly looked up and over the rubble to see Kazuma land on top of one of the men. The man quickly fell down to the ground as the alter user glowed with a rainbow aura, his right arm cocked for a punch. Huge chunks of concrete burst into a cloud of atoms that restructured themselves as Kazuma's alter and he punched the man in the face right as they made contact with the ground, burying the man's helmet into the concrete and nearly crushing the visor.

The remaining soldier was stunned by the teen's sudden appearance, but it didn't stop him from reaching up to his helmet and taking a few quick steps away from his partner and Kazuma.

"This is group D! We're under attack by a native- ough!"

Nabiki was surprised by the rock that suddenly collided with the man's helmet, knocking him off of his feet. She followed the trajectory back to Ryouga, who stood above the rubble with his arm extended.

"Damn it," She muttered. "We need to go! Now!" She and Kimishima quickly got up and started running down the street.

"Kanami, come on!" Kazuma shouted out. The girl was sitting up where she'd been and watching him with wide eyes. The young brunette quickly recovered and started running after them.

"Kazu-kun, I knew you were an alter user!" She shouted.

"That's not import- huh?" Kazuma blinked in surprise and slowed down. "Wait, how did you-"

"That doesn't matter!" Nabiki said. "We need to hurry!"

_**-**__**スクライド**__**-**_

Ranma touched down on the concrete in front of the door to the garage and stood up, then frowned. Parts of the building had been smashed by the boulders from above, namely the entrance to the garage itself, but she could see that certain parts of it were intact. She dove in through a window and started looking around. She made her way deeper into the garage and noticed that the cars were largely unharmed, save for where the building itself had been crushed. She looked around and nodded.

"Well, looks like we can get up through here. The question is how?" She quickly looked around. "The controls for the elevator should be around here somewhere… And I'm sure there's one just for people, like the one we used to get down…" She started walking around the back, looking around.

She spotted the elevator, ran over to it and started pushing buttons, but it didn't respond.

"Hmm… In this case, you could use a fire escape, normally, but… this elevator isn't exactly…" She grunted and grabbed the door, and pushed with all her might, forcing it open, much to the door's noisy protest. She walked inside and looked up; it was just like the other one in that it was steel cage-style unlike a normal elevator. There was a fire escape, and a ladder that lead very far up.

"Well… looks like we're in business… sorta…"

-スクライド-

"Halt!"

Nabiki cursed as she heard the voice of a young man from overhead. She looked up in time to see a soldier dressed just like the other two, but wearing purple and white instead. He was standing on a ring that seemed to be made of glowing green energy, and flying after them.

"For the crime of attacking two soldiers of HOLD, I'm placing you under arrest! If you resist any further, the extent your crimes will only be made worse!"

"Who gives a damn!" Kazuma shouted back. "You guys get to the garage! I'll take care of this guy!" He knelt down and leapt up, grabbing hold of the man's ring with his right hand, and started swinging, pulling it off balance. "Come down here and fight like a man!" Kazuma shouted with a grin.

"Let go of that, you savage!"

"Kazu-kun!" Kanami shouted, but Nabiki grabbed her by the wrist and kept running.

"He can take care of this," Nabiki said. "Trust him."

The younger girl looked up at her and nodded, and Kazuma watched them from his place on the green floating ring until they turned around a corner. He suddenly noticed that the ring was flying straight towards a building out of the corner of his eye.

"Whoops!" He let go of the ring and twisted in the air, landing on the building's wall, and jumped down to the ground, spinning on his foot once he landed, until he faced the HOLY soldier, who was similarly floating down to the ground. "Heh! Nice try!"

"If you insist on resisting further, then I can't be responsible for any permanent injuries." The HOLY soldier said.

Kazuma held his right arm forward and clenched his fist.

"Heh, good, good! Let's have fun!"

The HOLY soldier shook his head.

"I do not wish to fight-"

"That's too bad!" Kazuma snorted as he leapt up into the air pulled back his fist. "_Shocking__ First Bullet!"_ One of the red fins on his back disintegrated, and he flew forward with a burst of speed, spinning in the air several times with a trail of green energy flowing behind him.

-_**Gray Skies Part 6: End**_-


End file.
